Me and My friends in Holes
by BrandedButterfly
Summary: This is about me and my friends. We make one little mistake and BAM! We're in Greenlake. But we have a big secret. Read to find out!
1. the girls

Hey Hey!!! This is another holes ficcy for me!! Be afraid, be very afraid!! Nah, I'm jk!! I know you really all love my stories. *cough cough* Yay I'm watching my favorite movie!! Can you guess what it is?? The Nightmare before Christmas of course!! Best movie in the entire world, ya know. Okay, well I don't own Camp Greenlake or anything else you recognize, but everything you don't recognize I do own. Well, I don't technically own the people cause they're all going to be based on real people but they are my friends not yours so you can't have them, okay?? Okay, on with the story!! Oh yeah, and these people are my friends but I'm going to make them as real as I possibly can so I'm not going to make them seem better or prettier or nicer than they really are, okay?? Kiwi  
  
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A dirty yellow school bus rattled along a long dirt road. The seven girls sitting on that bus were all hot, tired, and sweaty. They had been sitting on that bus for a long, long time. Their butts were numb, their noses sunburned, and their throats aching for something to drink.  
  
Ayla tucked her legs up under her almost non-existent butt. She was beginning to think that her choice of tight flared MUDDs was a bad idea, even if they were filled with holes. She picked up her CD player and stuck her headphones over her head. Her hair was too short to put up, so it was down and she had to stick her headphones over it. She pressed play, and Wakefield blared in her ears.  
  
Emily sat on the seat across from Ayla. She was wearing a plain pair of blue jeans low on her hips, and, like Ayla, was regretting her choice of such hot pants. She was also listening to her CD player, a special mix of her favorite songs before her parents had made her get rid of their song-collection. She sighed and let her head fall back on the seat back.  
  
Stephanie sat in front of her, wearing incredibly short shorts. It kind of made Ayla and Emily laugh, because no doubt her thighs were sticking to the vinyl-covered seats. She didn't have her CD player, because she'd already run out of batteries. Instead she was humming, pretending she was the best singer in the entire world.   
  
Bethany sat across from her. She was also wearing jeans, but they had elastic around the waist because she had no hips or butt to hold them up. Since her wrists were so tiny, she had managed to slip her hands out of the heavy silver handcuffs. She was coloring in a coloring book, almost oblivious to the heat. Her crayons were almost melted.   
  
Kali sat in front of Bethany, wearing mid-thigh length blue jean shorts and a shiny white belt. She was playing a game on her cell phone, which was surprising that she even got service way out there in the middle of wherever they were.   
  
Erin sat across from her, the handcuffs cutting into her pale wrists. She felt like crying. Never had her circumstances seemed so dire as they did now. She shrugged her shoulders in a shudder, and then grimaced.  
  
The last girl, Molly, sat by herself behind Ayla. She kept grinning broadly and babbling, acting like they were on some big adventure that would be amazing.   
  
"We're here," Erin announced, plucking nervously at the fancy and expensive necklace that hung around her pale neck.  
  
"Great!" Molly cheered, sitting on her knees and pressing her face against the dirty glass of the bus windows.   
  
"I can't believe we have to do this," Emily said in dread, also peering out the streaked window.  
  
"It was either this or jail," Bethany snapped. She had a waspish attitude when she was ignited, and the others knew that all too well.   
  
"Come on, get off," The guard snapped, holding his rifle tightly in his hands. He was wearing long pants too, but he was on the shaded part of the bus. He unlocked their handcuffs and they filed off the bus, one by one, with their backpacks.  
  
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The D-tent boys were lined up outside the showers, waiting for their turn, when the bus pulled up in the middle of the camp.  
  
"Fresh meat!" Somebody yelled from the crowd that was milling around.  
  
"Why are we getting new campers?" X-ray mused out loud to his friends. "There aren't any vacancies right now."  
  
"Who knows?" Armpit shrugged his vast shoulders. The doors of the bus swished open and the guard climbed off. The person who followed him, however, caught everybody's attention.  
  
It was a girl. She wasn't beautiful, but she had a slightly cute look about her. She was kind of pale, and had lots of freckles. She had thin almost-black hair that reached past her shoulders and was tied into cute pigtail braids. She was wearing mid-thigh length blue jean shorts and a white belt, a purple t-shirt with the sleeves rolled up, and a pair of black platform flip-flops. Her backpack was tan with black piping, and it had one strap like a purse. She was also carrying a tan purse with a brown leather strap, and it was small and shoulder.  
  
Then, to further everyone's surprise, a second girl got off. This one was incredibly pale and had very rosy cheeks. She had short, thick blonde hair and big watery blue eyes. She was wearing a pair of blue jeans, a pretty brown and tan shirt with bell sleeves, and a pair of brown heeled slides with no socks. She was wearing a fancy and expensive looking necklace with matching earrings. Her nails were fake and had a French manicure. Her backpack was on both shoulders. It was royal blue and stuffed to the brim with things. Her purse was also a shoulder purse, but it was all brown leather.   
  
A third girl got off after the blonde. She was very tiny, probably no more than five foot. She was flat-chested, but her legs were very muscular. She wore a pair of flared blue jeans, a pale pink tank top, and a pair of white cheerleading sneakers. Her hair was thick and layered, and it reached halfway down her back. It was dirty blonde with lots of blonde highlights. She was pale with delicate skin, and she looked around apprehensively. Her backpack was hot pink with a stuffed duck poking out the top of it. She didn't have a purse with her.   
  
The fourth girl was taller, and very muscular. She had a slight tan, and thin, greasy blonde hair pulled back into a ponytail. She had a slight acne problem, and she wore way too much makeup. She was wearing incredibly short white jean shorts and a horrendously tight blue tank top that was probably supposed to be sexy. She was wearing worn sneakers that had seen a lot of track, and she was carrying her backpack in one hand. It was purple and frayed, and had a drawstring. Her purse was a shoulder purse, also made of brown leather, with a studded design on the side.  
  
The fifth girl was very tall and leggy, and very curvy. She had somewhat of a tan, and brown hair a little past her shoulders. She was wearing a pair of blue jeans that hugged her curves nicely, and a silky summer shirt that looked like it came from Express. (AN. I love that store!!) She was wearing a pair of black flip-flops and several toe-rings. Her backpack was navy and gray-blue. She was carrying a red and white tote bag-like purse with red straps.   
  
The sixth girl was about 5'3, one of the shorter ones present. She had short, dyed-black hair that was fanned around her face with hot-pink streaks and really bright blue eyes. She was wearing a pair of tight flared jeans that were faded and ripped in tons of places, a black Ruby Gloom tank top, and a pair of black low-tops that had been signed all over in pen. She wore silver hoops in three holes in her left ear, and only one on her right. Her nails were painted red with black polka-dots, like ladybugs. Her backpack was blue and signed all over in silver sharpie. Her purse was big, tan, and crocheted, and covered on every available surface with buttons. (AN. In case you haven't realized, this one is me. I just cut my hair, and I like it a lot!! I don't actually have the pink tips yet, but I'm going to get them as soon as possible!!)  
  
The seventh girl had dark-toned skin and dark hair, which gave her an Indian-like look. She was wearing a floofy orange skirt, a black fitted t-shirt, and a pair of orange low-tops with black laces. She was wearing a lot of beads and bangles, and she had bottle-top earrings in her ears that looked homemade. Her backpack was dark maroon. Her purse was blue with a white strap, and she had two or three things pinned to it.   
  
Everyone waited, but no more girls got off the bus.  
  
"Come on, follow me," The guard told them. He grabbed the little blonde one around the upper arm. She just looked at him, then started to scream shrilly. All those who hadn't been staring were definitely staring now.   
  
"Let go of her!" The greasy-haired blonde snapped, trying to wrench her tiny friend loose. The guard looked around in surprise, then released his hold on her arm.   
  
"Just follow me." He grumbled, leading the way into a cabin.  
  
A man was sitting behind a desk, wearing a cowboy hat and cowboy boots, gnawing away on a handful of sunflower seeds.   
  
"Sit down." He mumbled, taking the clipboard from the guard, who looked grateful.  
  
Since there were only two chairs placed before the desk, there was an immediately discarding of backpacks and scrambling for seats. Those that didn't manage to get a chair sat on top of those that did.  
  
"All right, I'm going to read your names off this list and I want you to tell me which one of you is which." The man said, spitting out some sunflower shells. "Bethany Reagan Brinkly," (AN. I'm only using their first name for real, for obvious reasons)  
  
The petite girl in pink whimpered, her stuffed duck held tightly to her chest.   
  
"Erin Eden Hillin,"  
  
"Yes sir," The blue-eyed blonde said politely, plucking at her necklace still.  
  
"Emily Carise (AN. Ka-reese) Hudson,"   
  
The tall leggy girl raised her hand without saying anything. She was eating a caramel-filled Hershey kiss that was already half-melted.  
  
"Kali Libby Jordan,"  
  
The freckled dark-haired girl giggled profusely. "Here!"  
  
"Molly Megan Thomas,"  
  
"Awww yeah!" The Indian-looking girl pumped her fist up into the air gleefully. The others just stared at her.   
  
"Stephanie Alissa Thomas,"  
  
The busty blonde pretended to be cute and innocent. "Here," She smiled.   
  
"And Ayla Melanie Wilson." He finished up his list.   
  
The black-haired girl didn't even bother to answer him. She just chewed on one of the pink streaks, staring at him blankly.   
  
"I am Mr. Sir." He continued, not noting their bored stares.  
  
Stephanie burst into laughter, and Molly and Kali soon joined her. The others even offered small smiles of amusement.   
  
"Think my name is funny, do ya?" Mr. Sir snarled menacingly.  
  
"Yeah, as a matter of fact we do." Molly answered honestly. She'd never had a problem with speaking her mind.   
  
Mr. Sir glared at them all. "Your job is to dig a hole every single day until you are released. The hole will be five feet deep and five feet in diameter. Do I make myself clear?"  
  
"Crystal." Bethany replied shrilly. "You will get two sets of clothes. One will be for work, and one will be for relaxation. Every three days your work clothes will be washed and your recreation clothes will become your work clothes." Mr. Sir continued with his explanation.   
  
"Gross!" Emily whispered loud enough for them all to hear.   
  
"You will be in G-tent because there is no room anywhere else and the Warden thought it would be highly inappropriate to put girls in a guys tent." (AN. Take that all you putgirlsinguystents-ers!! Myself included………lol) Mr. Sir said. "You will have the same counselor as D-tent, because we don't have any counselors to spare."  
  
"Girls, you may have done some bad things in your lives, but that does not make you bad people!" Pendanski declared, bursting through the door. Mr. Sir rolled his eyes heavenward. "I respect you."  
  
"Hey! We didn't do anything bad!" Bethany protested furious, changing almost instantaneously from her sweet, frightened state to her furious werewolf state. "It's all Molly and Ayla's fault!"  
  
"Shut up!" Ayla snapped. (AN. Me and Bethany fought a TON when we were younger. We don't really do it anymore………)  
  
"You!" Stephanie came to Bethany's aid.  
  
"Bitch." Molly muttered under her breath, kicking Stephanie's shin unobtrusively. She'd never been terribly fond of Stephanie.   
  
"Everybody just shut up!" Erin yelled loudly, taking control as usual. Everyone fell silent, sullenly glaring at one another. It had been a long, tiring day.   
  
"Well," Pendanski said finally. They stopped their sulking and glared at him. "I guess I'll show you to your tent now. Your clothes, canteens, and shower tokens are waiting for you there."  
  
"We have to sleep in a tent?" Ayla demanded with narrowed eyes. "In heat like this? You've got to be kidding me."  
  
"Just because you are young ladies does not mean that the rules will be changed for you." Pendanski told them as he led them out of the cabin. "You still did bad stuff to get sent here and that's why you're being punished."  
  
"Why are there only boys?" Kali whispered, loud enough for only her friends to hear.   
  
"I think we're the only girls here at this camp." Ayla said, her bright blue eyes lighting up mischievously. "That means that even Stephanie can snag a boyfriend."  
  
Stephanie stuck her tongue out at Ayla.   
  
"There's the mess-hall, the rec-room, and the showers," Pendanski obliviously continued with his tour of the camp.   
  
"Woah, back up there," Molly held up her hand and pointed to the showers, where there was still a line of boys only half-dressed. "We have to shower in that?" Molly wasn't the most modest person in the world, but even she found that completely inappropriate.   
  
"Yes. There's only one knob because there's only one temperature: cold." Pendanski said cheerfully. He didn't seem to get it.   
  
"Do you want us to get raped?" Stephanie demanded furiously. She wasn't really that modest either, but she cared as well. The others nodded their agreement; an open-air shower like that didn't look too promising when they were the only girls around for a hundred miles.   
  
"Oh, the boys know better than that," Pendanski replied confidently, taking a lot of steps because his legs were so short. The girls weren't so sure. "Ah, here's your tent. Get settled. The whistle will sound when it's time for dinner. You can sit with my other group, D-tent. They can show you around and tell you how things work around here."  
  
He waited as though they would say something, but nobody did, so he shrugged and left them.   
  
Slowly, ever so slowly, the seven girls ascended the creaky wooden steps and went into the tent. It looked freshly erected, as though it hadn't been there before. It had a wooden floor, with roof and sides made of green canvas. There were seven new cots with sheets and pillows, and a stack of seven crates for them to store their belongings in. Two sets of ugly orange jumpsuits, a canteen, and a bunch of little silver coins waiting expectantly on the end of each bed.   
  
They all looked at each other, then sighed heavily.   
  
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Mwuhahahaha!! Didja like? I hope u did. I've been wanting to write a story w/ me and my friends in it for a while, but I wasn't sure quite how to go about doing it. I'm going to go to the movies and the mall with Erin and Kali and Emily tomorrow, and I think I'm going to spend the night at Kali's house. YAY!! Fun stuff!! KK, review for me cause I know u love me!! *I hope* kiwi kisses 


	2. meeting the boys

Sorry that it's been so long since I last posted. I've been in Disney World on a marching band trip. We got to march at Magic Kingdoms, which means we're really, really good. It was sooo nice and hot there, but I got this weird shaped sunburn because of my uniform and it looks really, really stupid and it hurts, but I guess it was definitely worth it. I had sooo much fun. My friends and I rode Space Mountain four times in a row, and the last time my friend Katie tickled me nonstop through the whole ride so I was screaming continuously without taking a breath. It was actually kind of funny. Oh, and I found out what my name means in Chinese supposedly. "Love Pull" or something. I have gotten a lot of grief from that too!! LOL!! Okay, well I'll just shut up now and write and listen to Simple Plan on my CD player!!  
  
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The seven girls dropped their backpacks dispiritedly onto their cots, claiming them as they did so. Emily picked up her jumpsuit and unfolded it.  
  
"I knew orange was in right now, but this is definitely over the top." She declared in disgust.   
  
"Maybe we could take them in and make them tighter, so they'd be more like bodysuits." Stephanie suggested.   
  
"See a sewing machine anywhere?" Ayla asked acidly. She and Emily both loved to sew, and it pissed her off even more that she couldn't do so here. (AN. Emily and I are both in home ec, and we've been sewing clothes ever since Christmas break.)  
  
"Besides, they would be really hot and uncomfortable if they were tighter." Erin pointed out. She hated tight clothing.   
  
"I like my clothes tight." Bethany snapped, sitting cross-legged on her cot and hugging her stuffed duck very, very tightly. She looked rather resentful.   
  
"Let's just change into them." Kali suggested, trying to keep peace between her friends. They loved to fight, and she knew it very well.   
  
So reluctantly they all stripped down to their bras and underwear and pulled their jumpsuits on and buttoned them up. They all wore tank tops or t-shirts underneath in case they got hot. Ayla wore a black t-shirt that said "I Thought Fairies Did Nice Things, Like Granting Wishes." on it and left the top part of her jumpsuit unzipped and let it hang down around her waist.   
  
Then they all sat around doing what they loved to do the most. Erin was reading Little Women, one of her favorite books, for about the hundredth time, since she loved to read. Kali was making little signs on index cards with her markers, and she was going to give the colorful cards out to her friends when she was done. Molly was listening to All American Rejects on her CD player and singing along loudly. Stephanie was trying to make her cell-phone get service so she could call one of her many "boyfriends". It wasn't working. Bethany was still coloring in her coloring book, but her crayons had hardened slightly. Emily was flipping through a Seventeen magazine, examining the latest fashions that she was going to miss while she was at Camp Greenlake. Ayla was listening to The Used on her CD player and writing a story. Since she hadn't been allowed to bring her laptop with her, she had to write it on regular notebook paper and she didn't like that very much.  
  
The whistle sounded loudly about half an hour later. They all stopped what they were doing and looked up, but nobody moved from her cot.  
  
"What should we do?" Bethany asked worriedly. She was obviously in one of her cute, sweet, innocent stages.   
  
"Well, we have to go." Molly said firmly, taking off her headphones and hiding her CD player underneath her pillow in case anybody came into the tent. "I'm too hungry to skip dinner altogether, ya know."  
  
"Yeah, me too." Ayla agreed, putting her CD player and notebook back into her backpack and shaking back her short, streaked hair. Her earrings jangled together. (AN. I LOVE wearing hoops in all my holes and hearing them clink together. That has gone into my Happy Book like a zillion times!!)  
  
"So, let's go." Emily urged, but still nobody moved.  
  
"We really need to go." Kali said finally. "We're going to be late and everybody is going to stare at us all the more." For someone who was supposedly a dumb-"blonde", Kali was amazingly insightful at times.  
  
So the seven of them tore themselves up off their cots and left their tent. It was dusk outside, and everything had settled into a dead, gloomy night. They walked slowly toward the lighted mess-hall, their various brands of sneakers getting dusty in the process. That pissed Bethany off to no end, because she loved her cheerleading sneakers.  
  
They pushed open the door and entered the mess hall. All their delaying had done the worst. Everybody was already sitting down and they stopped everything and just stared at the seven girls in their midst.  
  
Molly, who was always the most easy-going around guys, moved first and headed for the food-line. She added a little extra swing in her hip, but it wasn't necessary. The boys all thought she was beautiful and she knew it.   
  
The others hurriedly regained their composure and moved forward in a group, trying not to appear intimidated and clingy.   
  
"G-Tent," Pendanski came over to them just as they were getting out of line with their trays loaded with inedible food. "You're going to sit over here with D-tent, my other group. They're right there." And he pointed.   
  
"Kay." Ayla shrugged her tiny shoulders and led the way over to the table. She plopped down on the bench next to a guy with really frizzy blonde hair and bright blue eyes. He regarded her as though she was an alien and inched away slightly.  
  
"Don't worry Zig, I don't think she'll bite." A black guy with thick glasses joked from the head of the table.   
  
The girls all shot accusing stares at Ayla, and she blushed bright red and ducked her head, her dark hair falling over her face.  
  
"I wouldn't be too sure about that." Kali pointed out. "As long as you don't say 'bite me', she'll keep her teeth to herself."  
  
"You mean you actually bite people?" The guy sitting directly across from Ayla regarded her with something that was a little more than curiosity.   
  
"If they tell me to." Ayla said defensively, pushing her food around on her plate as though she was afraid it would jump up and eat her instead of her eating it.  
  
"That's awesome!" The guy declared, flashing her a sexy smile. She blushed slightly.  
  
"So what are ya'lls names?" Molly asked, leaning forward on her elbows, letting her ponytail fall over her shoulder.  
  
"I'm X-ray," The black guy at the head of the table said. "This is Squid, Armpit, ZigZag, Magnet, Zero, and Twitch. And ya'll are?"  
  
"I'm Z." Molly introduced herself. (AN. She's Z because we used to call her Mollzie, and then we just shortened it to Z.)  
  
"I'm Butch." Stephanie said sweetly, winking. (AN. Butch is her colorguard nickname because she's really muscular and strong and she's better than a lot of the guys in our band lol)  
  
"I'm Bethany." Bethany said. (AN. We've tried giving her nicknames all the time but she hates them all. *shrugs*)  
  
"I'm Rin." Erin said.   
  
"I'm KJ." Kali said (AN. Those are her initials.)  
  
"I'm M&M." Emily introduced herself. (AN. Don't even ASK where that name came from.)  
  
"And you are?" Squid, the guy who had been talking to her earlier, urged Ayla expectantly. He was chewing on a toothpick even though it was dinner time.  
  
"Della, B, Silver, Wolf," Ayla shrugged. (My last name is really ware, so my friends call me stuff like Delaware, beware, silverware, werewolf, ect………) "Then there's also Amy Lee, Sailor Moon, Raven, Morticia Adams, Christina, or Ayla, which is my real name." (I got all those other nicknames when I dyed my hair black. Because I'm really pale, everyone thinks it makes me look Gothic or something. And then my friend Amanda thinks it makes me look like Sailor Moon, though I don't know why. Sailor Moon has blonde hair.) (AN. All my other friends have more nicknames too, I just don't know them all.)  
  
"Don't forget Love Pull and Socks." Stephanie added in. (AN. Band nicknames)  
  
"We usually just call her Ayla." Kali whispered loudly.   
  
"Ayla? That's your real name?" Squid demanded incredulously. "That's a really weird name, ya know."  
  
"Yeah, so?" Ayla demanded archly. She usually loved her name, but not when somebody was making fun of it.   
  
"I like it. That's all." He shrugged, and he went back to eating.  
  
"Okay, I can't eat this crap." Emily declared suddenly, angrily. She shoved her tray away from her furiously. "I'm going to go back to the tent. Anybody coming with me?"  
  
"I will." Ayla, who was her best friend in the group, agreed quickly. She didn't have much of an appetite for brunt mush anyway. They two of them threw away their food in the garbage cans and walked back to their tent.  
  
"I'm not blaming you or anything, A," Emily said cautiously, unbuttoning her jumpsuit and pulling it off. She was wearing a pink Paul Frank t-shirt with three monkeys heads on it. She put her flip-flops neatly under her bed next to he blue and gray tennis shoes, and she folded her jumpsuit. She pulled on a pair of green Paul Frank monkey boxers and whipped her hair up into a ponytail. "But come on, don't you think this is a little much?"  
  
"What, you think it's my fault the food sucks?" Ayla said defensively, kicking off her chucks and yanking her jumpsuit off. She shoved them in her crate unceremoniously, and pulled on a pair of navy blue cheerleading shorts rolled down once. She couldn't put her hair up, so she didn't even try.   
  
"It's not the food, Ayla, and you know it." Emily said seriously, settling down cross-legged on her bed with her magazine. "It's that stupid idea you and Molly came up with."  
  
"Hey, that's all it was! An idea!" Ayla exclaimed, flopping down on her bed like a sack of potatoes. She tucked her legs up under her, her favorite way to sit.   
  
"At first." Emily corrected her. "Then Molly came along and made it a reality."  
  
"Hey, you guys all went along with us." Ayla said defensively, crossing her arms over her rather small chest.   
  
"Only because you two talked us into it." Emily sighed heavily and hugged her polyester-clad pillow to her chest. "If only we were like normal kids, then this never would have happened." She often felt remorse at the gifts that the seven of them possessed.   
  
"Well we're not normal kids." Ayla said sharply. She hated when her friends wanted to be something that they could never be. It was just one of her pet peeves, of which she had many. "We're never going to be normal kids!"   
  
"Well I still wish we were!" Emily shot back, and a heavy silence fell between them.   
  
Ayla finally rolled off her cot, pulled her diary out of her backpack. She'd been keeping a diary since she was in fourth grade, and had about ten of them now. She was halfway through with this one. She settled down in the middle of her cot and began to write, something she hadn't done in quite a while now. She felt that she needed to write some things down.   
  
Emily went back to flipping regretfully through her magazine.   
  
After a while, everyone but Stephanie returned to the tent. They talked about how awful the food was and which guys they thought were the hottest as they changed into their nightclothes and pulled their hair off their necks for the night. (AN. I know that sleeping with your hair up is bad for it, but I still can't stand sleeping with hair on my neck. It itches sooo much!!)  
  
"Hey, where's Stephanie?" Ayla finally noticed. Since they were both in color guard, they were often together and so they were really used to one another.   
  
"She stayed out to flirt with the boys." Molly rolled her eyes. "I don't think they were very pleased with that."   
  
"Well we knew she'd start in on them soon enough," Kali rolled her eyes upward. "I don't see why ya'll are so surprised."   
  
"Good point." Erin agreed in a low voice.   
  
"All right, I'm tired. I vote we go to sleep now." Bethany said, snuggling under her sheet in her over-sized Duck t-shirt with her stuffed duck in her arms. "If we really have to dig five feet deep holes, which is deeper than I am tall, then we're going to need all our energy."   
  
The others murmured their assent.   
  
"All right, everybody ready?" Erin asked, poised by the light switch in her long nightgown.   
  
"Yeah." The girls chorused.   
  
Erin flipped the light switch off and climbed into her cot. Everyone fell silent, and there was no sound except for the groaning of the cots and the breathing of the girls as they tried desperately to fall asleep.   
  
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kk, did u like the story so far?? I hope u did. Erin read it for the first time today, and Kali re-read it. Emily and Molly have been bugging me to post another chappie for awhile now. Stephanie and Bethany haven't read it. Stephanie hasn't for obvious reason, and Bethany and I actually aren't that close anymore. When we were younger we were the original six, and now we've kind of split off into smaller groups. Well, okay, Bethany split off from our group. But the rest of us are still tight. I just needed a seventh person for it. Molly was automatically in, even though she wasn't one of the original six. We didn't start hanging till about seventh grade, but oh well. Enough of THAT history lesson. I guess I better post this and get it over with because I have to finish up my English project as soon as I eat dinner. *sigh* I hate English, because my teacher is an idiot. Sweet, but an idiot. Kay, so I'll leave u alone w/ ur thoughts now I guess. Lots of love, and review, review, review!! 


	3. the first time digging

Hey hey. Yeah yeah, I know I'm posting this really quick and without a whole lot of reviews, but I'm making an exception just this once. My friends that are in this story have been bugging me to up-date it. In fact, we were talking about it Friday morning during high school cheerleading tryouts for next year. But anyway, Emily and I just got back from a church retreat and it was a lot of fun!! We swam across the river on Saturday and had this huge mud-fight. Only it wasn't supposedly mud. It was supposedly cow crap, and we were rolling around in it. We had it on our faces, in our hair, all over our bodies. We buried a junior named Miriam in it. It was the grossest thing, but it was so much fun. We also played a lot of games of capture the flag in the dark. In the last game, Gretchen and I were exploring the lodge and Trey kept jumping out and scaring the crap out of us and the boys were turning the lights on an off. The girls lost every game we played. *sigh* oh well. The boys cheat. Okay, well I'll stop telling you all about my weekend, and I'll just go on and write the story.  
  
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A record playing of a bugle sounded through the PA system loudly about five o'clock the next morning.   
  
Emily was the first to get up, because she was already an early-riser. Perhaps not quite as early as five, but it didn't bother her too terribly much. She was in an odd mood as she got dressed, humming along to a Blink 182 song she had stuck in her head. She pulled on a white Bubba Gump (AN. Hey Em, I still have your shirt with the flying piggies on it. Remind me to give it back to you next time I see you) t-shirt with the sleeves cut-off. (AN. I know Emily's Bubba Gump t-shirt does not have the sleeves cut off, but it does for my story because it's really hot and I think it would look good on Em.) She put her jumpsuit on over it.   
  
Erin got up next, just because she was used to getting up at five-thirty during the school year anyway. She noticed that Emily was humming, so she decided to hum too. She didn't hum Blink 182, of course. That wasn't the kind of music Erin listened to. Instead, she hummed 'I Will Remember You' by Sarah McLaughlin that they had sung in eighth grade chorus together when Molly had changed schools. Erin was a very big singer. She wore her jumpsuit and a tie-dye t-shirt from seventh and eighth grade chorus.   
  
Molly was up next, because she was excited. She joined with Emily in singing Blink 182 while she got dressed. She put on a blue Paul Frank t-shirt with three monkey heads on it underneath her jumpsuit. She braided her hair and put on her many beads and bangles. She left her bottle-cap earrings off.   
  
"This sucks." Bethany grumbled, rolling out of bed with her duck clutched safely in her arms. She hadn't let go of it all night. Then again, she hadn't been asleep most of the night. She changed into a white t-shirt from her dance studio, rolled the sleeves up, and put on her jumpsuit. She pulled her hair up into pigtails, which made her look even younger than she really was.  
  
"No, I will NOT get up." Ayla said firmly, her face pressed into her pillow as though she were desperately trying to suffocate herself. "This is NOT band camp."  
  
"Shut up." Kali said grumpily, braiding her hair into two braids. She had already gotten dressed in a bright orange t-shirt that almost matched her jumpsuit perfectly. She had the sleeves rolled up and the neck cut out.  
  
Ayla made some incomprehensible noise and rolled out of bed. She pulled on a big gray sorority T-shirt with the sleeves rolled up (that's the shirt I wore to go mudding this weekend, and not it's stained with mud!! *pout* oh well, I'll just have to keep washing it until all the brown stains are gone!!) and her jumpsuit. Since her hair was too short to really put up so it would stay, she put it back underneath a black bandanna like a pirate's. She hadn't taken all her jewelry off, so she didn't have to put any back on. She was the only one out of them all that wore contacts, so they had to wait while she put them in.   
  
They debated on whether to leave Stephanie lying asleep, snoring, on her cot. In the end, Erin said they had to wake her. So they reluctantly pushed her off her cot.   
  
"I'm up!" She shouted when she hit the floor. She hurriedly got up and put on a plain black spaghetti strap tank top underneath her jumpsuit. She put her hair up into a ponytail like usual.   
  
Then the seven of them left their tent and followed the crowds of sleepy boys towards a small shack labeled LIBRARY.  
  
"Hey." X-ray greeted them as the D-tent boys came up from behind them.   
  
The girls merely grunted in response.  
  
"Ready for a long day of digging?" Squid asked them cheerfully. They all turned to him with bored, flat stares.  
  
Then Stephanie said proudly, "We can handle it." She was pretending to be cute again.  
  
The boys all laughed. But not because she was cute.  
  
Ayla suddenly stuck out her hand to Squid. "Give me your hat." She told him sternly.   
  
He looked at her like she was crazy, his hand going automatically to the worn baseball cap perched on his dark hair. "Excuse me?"   
  
"Give. Me. Your. Hat." She repeated very slowly.  
  
"Why?" He demanded, still holding his hat onto his head.  
  
  
  
She sighed heavily, then glared at him as though it was his fault he was dumb. "Don't ask stupid questions. Just hand it over."  
  
Squid looked at his friends helplessly, then reluctantly handed her his baseball cap. She put it on her head over her bandanna. It would have been hopelessly big were it not for the bandanna, which made it fit a little better. It still fell down over her eyes. She pushed it back and turned her back on him.  
  
"Somebody's got a crush." Emily whispered under her breath to Ayla as they moved up in the line and Molly and Stephanie began to flirt. Molly was good at it. Stephanie thought she was good at it.  
  
"I do not." Ayla said defensively, but they both knew she was lying. Emily could see right through any of Ayla's lies.   
  
"Whatever you say." Emily shrugged indifferently, smiling in an amused sort of way.   
  
"Shut up." Ayla said crossly, holding the hat protectively on her head.   
  
It was very hot as they were digging. Very, very hot. Hotter than band camp on the white tarp for Ayla and Stephanie. (AN. When I was in eighth grade, we did The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe for our marching show. We had this huge winterguard tarp out on the field to use for snow. Not only did it reflect light and make it almost impossible to see, it was also like ten degrees hotter than everywhere else.) It was hotter than a dance dressing room for Bethany. It was hotter than the middle of the summer for everybody else.   
  
"I can't take this anymore!" Kali snapped finally, uncharacteristically slamming her shovel into her hole angrily. Her hands were already getting blistered and sore, and the back of her neck was frying. She glanced upwards, and concentrated. Suddenly, a huge wind blew a bunch of clouds across the sun. For the first time in the history of the camp, there were clouds.  
  
"Wow!" Twitch exclaimed. "This is amazing! Clouds!" He began to hop up and down impatiently, as though it was going to rain. It didn't, so the boys all went back to digging their holes like they normally did. They hadn't really expected it to rain anyway.  
  
"Why didn't you make it rain?" Erin, who was Kali's best friend, demanded of her impatiently. Her blonde hair was stuck to her forehead, which was steadily turning red from sunburn.   
  
Kali looked very shaken up. "I couldn't." She replied, her face even paler than normal. "I tried, and it isn't raining." She couldn't understand why it wasn't raining.  
  
"Something's wrong here." Emily whispered, glancing up at the clouds in a slightly worried way. She tugged nervously on her ponytail.   
  
None of the boys noticed that the girls were all worried about something, so they continued with their digging, grateful to no longer have the sun beating their backs and necks.  
  
Zero was the first done with his hole, then it was X-ray and ZigZag. Stephanie got done first out of the girls. Then Squid and Magnet got done. Ayla got done next, waited for Emily, and the two of them walked back. They didn't say anything while they went.   
  
  
  
"You stand watch for me and I stand watch for you?" Ayla suggested after they had fetched their towels out of their tent.   
  
"Sure." Emily agreed.  
  
So while Ayla took a shower, Emily kept watch. Then they switched. Once they were clean and dry, they wrapped towels around themselves and ran back to their tent. Once safely inside, they put on clean clothes and dried their hair the best they could without the aid of the much needed hair dryer and straightener.  
  
"Why do you think Kali couldn't make it rain?" Emily asked thoughtfully, levitating a few inches off her cot while she combed through her wet hair. She loved to levitate when she was doing trivial things like combing her hair.   
  
"I don't know." Ayla shrugged her shoulders. "Will you toss me that bandanna over there on Molly's cot?" She pointed.   
  
"Why don't you get it?" Emily asked.  
  
"Because it's all the way across the room." Ayla pointed out. "And I don't want to get up to go get it." She was kind of lazy sometimes.   
  
"Why don't you use your powers?"  
  
"Because I don't want to rely completely on my powers to get me through life." Ayla said matter-of-factly, folding her arms in front of the white and pink Bazooka Bubblegum T-shirt she was wearing. On the back it said, 'Don't Burst My Bubble'.   
  
"Then you get up off your butt and get it." Emily told her acidly, still combing. The shower had been very short, and she hated short showers.  
  
"You suck." Ayla informed her, holding up her hand with her palm facing out. The bandanna flew into her hand, and she tied it over her hair.  
  
"Now was that so hard?" Emily asked, dropping her comb to the cot beneath her and floating over to where Ayla sat.  
  
"Bite me." Ayla said good-naturedly.   
  
"No way. You're too sour." Emily replied automatically. Ayla rolled her eyes, but she was smiling. They did this a lot.   
  
The others came back a little while later. Then the bell rang to announce dinner.  
  
"I'm too tired to eat." Stephanie complained, falling down onto her cot dramatically. Her blonde hair, which had been washed but didn't look it, was down and Stephanie flipped it around a lot.   
  
"Well I'm not." Ayla announced. "See ya later." And the others trooped out. Stephanie had to run to keep up with them.   
  
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Yeah yeah, I know it's really short but I don't have time for anything else. I have to do my math homework and my English homework. My English teacher, sweet as she may be, is hopelessly stupid. We spent a month reading Call of the Wild. Then we spent three fourths of the year reading Oliver Twist. Then we spent about two months reading the Odyssey. We've spent the last month reading Great Expectations. We have three weeks left of school and she expects us to finish Romeo and Juliet, and we haven't even started. See what I mean? Well, so I guess I'll go. I'm pretty tired, and I still have to write in my diary, which I've been putting off for weeks. I should have written ages ago, so I still have to write about Disney World, the retreat this past weekend, and what I did tonight. Kali and Erin and I went to the mall after school. We saw 13 Going on 30, and it was really good. I cried at the end. It was so good. I thought the guy in it was kinda cute. Then we went back to school and saw the high school talent show. It was cool. But all anybody did was sing, and that gets WAY boring. Okay, well I gotta go, so bunches of love!! 


	4. the past

Hey hey!! Guess what!! I got my pink streaks the other day!! Kali doesn't like them pout but I do so I guess it doesn't really matter. Anyway, sorry that it's been so long since I last posted. I was busy with exams and crap like that. Well now school's over and it's summer vacay!! And I have absolutely nothing to do, so I'll prolly be posting on ALL my stories a lot. Ya know?? KK, well I guess I can shut up now and continue with the story, because I know that's really what you want. And remember, I don't own anything but the person named Ayla in this story. But you can't have any of the other girls because you don't have their permission to use them. I do. giggle giggle  
  
As the girls lay on their cots that evening, they found it hard to sleep. They each tried their own special ways to help, but nothing seemed to be working.  
  
Erin sang to herself in her head.   
  
Kali counted sheep.  
  
Emily imagined all the fashions she wanted.  
  
Bethany went over some of her old dances in her head.  
  
Stephanie dreamed up more boyfriends.  
  
Molly imagined that she was playing rugby with a bunch of hot college guys.  
  
Ayla went over some of her band's songs in her head.   
  
They were all still awake though, no matter what they thought about or dreamed. And they were all awake for the same reason. They were remembering.  
  
four years before  
  
"I love miniature golf!" A twelve year old Ayla cheered excitedly, waving her golf club around. They were the only ones at the putt putt place because they were there for Kali's thirteenth birthday.   
  
"It looks like it's going to rain though." Erin said, shading her eyes and peering up at the sky. Clouds were scattered all over.  
  
"A little rain never hurt anybody." Molly declared cheerfully, watching as Emily tried to make a hard shot. She made it. She always did. (AN. For those of you who read Full Moon, Emily is the same person as Apple. Apple just looks different.)  
  
A couple minutes later, it did start to rain. And it wasn't just a little rain. It was pouring. The girls were soaked before they could even find a place to hide from the rain.  
  
"Over there!" Kali shouted above the rain, pointing to an umbrella perched over one of the picnic tables a couple feet away. They all sprinted for the table. They climbed on top and huddled together out of the rain.   
  
"I'm going to run and see if I can get a refund for this." Kali's mom said, and she didn't sound too happy. "We've only been out here for ten minutes." She covered her head and made a run for it to the office.  
  
Lightning lit the sky and thunder shook the ground. Bethany whimpered. She hated thunderstorms more than anything else. (AN. Uh………I don't know if that's actually true but shhhh!)  
  
Suddenly a bolt of lightning hit the rod on top of the umbrella. The electrical waves shot down over the umbrella and into the ground. They all opened their mouths and screamed like they had never screamed before.  
  
And then everything went black.   
  
When the girls came to, they were all in hospital beds with I.V.s hooked into their arms and machines to help them breathe.  
  
Ayla shifted her weight and the machine made a beep. A doctor with her back turned to Ayla turned around and smiled.  
  
"Ahh, so you're awake now sweetie." She said gently. "Just lay back and relax. You've had a pretty tough forty-eight hours?"  
  
"What happened?" Ayla struggled to get out. It was hard to talk because of the breathing mask.   
  
"You and your friends were struck by lightning." The doctor explained. "We don't think there's going to be any permanent damage."  
  
Ayla sighed with relief, sank back against her pillows, and promptly went to sleep.   
  
The seven girls were released from the hospital about two weeks later. It wasn't until during the summer when they realized that the lightning strike had indeed left permanent damage to each and every one of them.   
  
Ayla had been the first one to discover it. It was before her mom had gotten remarried and her sister had gone to college. The three of them were still living in the condo. She was in a fight (again) with her sister, and had been locked out of the bathroom.  
  
She's wanted into the bathroom badly, and her sister refused to unlock the door. Ayla grabbed the handle and desperately willed the door to unlock.  
  
And it did.  
  
Her sister was very surprised, but Ayla merely claimed to have picked the lock. It was a plausible story, because she was doing that a lot.   
  
Then she locked herself in her bedroom and experimented. She found that she could move things with her mind. She got online and looked it up, and found that her condition was called telekinesis. She hurriedly invited Emily over to show off.   
  
Emily was the second to discover her powers, and she found them while she was at Ayla's house. Ayla was moving things across the room and Emily was jumping off the bed trying to catch them.  
  
One of the times when she jumped, she just didn't want to fall. And she didn't. She experimented around with it, and was soon flying all over Ayla's room. Ayla tried to fly, and couldn't (much to her disappointment).   
  
Kali was the next to discover her powers. She was having a picnic with some friends, and the sky threatened to rain. When it did start to rain, she desperately wished that it would become sunny.   
  
And it did.  
  
Then she wished for it to become very, very cold.  
  
Even though it was the middle of summer, it did.  
  
She was amazed.   
  
Erin came into her powers next. She was baby-sitting for her little cousin and had already put her to bed. She was leaning against the door, trying to hear if her cousin was still awake or sleeping. She didn't want to open the door in case her cousin WAS asleep and it woke her up.   
  
Erin just wished she could somehow get into the room without having to open the door.  
  
And she fell through solid wood.   
  
She experimented around with it and found she could climb through anything solid that she wanted to.   
  
Bethany's power came during a dance recital. She got very angry at another dancer, and secretly wished the dancer's hair would all fall out. It didn't. Then she wished that the dancer's hair would freeze out, or maybe burn out.  
  
And the girl's hair caught on fire. It caught the entire dressing room on fire and the recital had been canceled. But Bethany knew what her power was.  
  
Then Molly found her power. She was trying to climb a tree, and it wasn't working. She wished she could climb it easier.   
  
Then her nails extended into claws and she scampered all the way up the tree. It didn't really bother her, but it surprised her.   
  
Stephanie was the last to find her power. It was while she was eating a melting Popsicle on her back porch. She wished that the Popsicle wouldn't melt.  
  
And it froze over again.   
  
Then she froze a lady-bug. Then she froze a neighbor's dog and had to bury it in her backyard before her neighbor noticed.   
  
When the school started at the end of August, they all got together.   
  
"Hey, you guys will never guess what I can do." Stephanie said at lunch the first day of seventh grade as they sat at a round table in the corner. And she proceeded to freeze everybody's drink.  
  
"No, that's nothing compared to what I can do." Bethany was proudly. And she un-froze everybody's drinks.   
  
"I can do this." Ayla stole Stephanie's drink from across the table with her mind and took a long sip. Then she sent it back.  
  
"I can fly." Emily offered.  
  
"I can control the weather." Kali said.  
  
"I can walk through walls." Emily said.   
  
Molly grinned. "I can make my nails draw into claws."   
  
"Wait, so we all have these weird supernatural powers?" Ayla asked, picking at her bologna, cheese, and mustard sandwich. (AN. That's the only kind of sandwich I'll eat. I know it sounds kind of gross, but………)  
  
"Maybe it happened when we got struck by lightning at Kali's party!" Emily exclaimed, her eyes going wide.   
  
"You're right!" Molly nodded fervently.  
  
"This is so cool!" Bethany squealed.  
  
"We have to keep this a complete secret from everybody." Erin said firmly. "If people find out what we can do, they'll want to do all these tests on us and we'll never have our lives back again! I read all about it an a book once."  
  
"She's right. We have to keep it a secret." Ayla agreed.  
  
"Let's take an oath." Stephanie suggested.   
  
"Good idea." Ayla pulled out a notebook and scribbled something down. "Everybody sign this. And then prick your finger to make it final."  
  
"Prick our fingers?" Bethany demanded skeptically. "I don't want to make myself bleed!"  
  
"Just do it!" Ayla snapped. She was the first to sign her name in a big loopy signature with a star at the end. Then she took a button she had pinned to her backpack and pricked her finger. She squeezed it until a drop of blood appeared, and he pressed it to the page next to her name. Then she passed the paper, pen, and button on.   
  
The others solemnly followed her actions.   
  
Then Ayla took the paper, folded it up, and took it home. Then she used some of her mom's special wax seals and sealed the paper in an envelope. Then she put it in a special box underneath the loose floorboard in her closet.   
  
When the bugle went off at five the next morning, the seven of them woke up and realized that they must have drifted off to sleep sometime during the night.   
  
They reluctantly got up and got dressed.   
  
Okay, did you like it? I hope you did. I stopped in the process of writing this and ate lunch. And I'm watching one of my favorite movies!! The Goonies. You know, the very 80s movie. With Sean Astin when he's really little and Corey Feldman. I LOVE Corey Feldman, lol!! Okay, well I guess I better go. Much luv!! Review!! 


	5. an odd protector

Okaysies. I know that I have not updated in quite a while, but as I only have twenty something reviews, I figured I would withhold the posties. Unfortunately, my withholding the posties hasn't helped a darn thing, so I figured I might as well go ahead and post some more. Hey, I'm having fun writing this story, so why not continue it, right?? Rightsies. Okay. I will shut the big hole in my face now and continue on. I just wish to say that after my trip to Florida a couple weeks ago, my pink streaks are no longer pink. They an orangey-bronze color now because of the sun. But, for the purpose of this story, they will remain pink. And not orangey-bronze.

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The boys seemed to notice, unobservant though they were, that the girls were extra tired as they trudged to get their shovels.  
  
"What's with ya'll?" Squid demanded, nudging Ayla with his arm. She flung her hands over his hat, which she still wore, protectively. (AN. I have this thing for baseball caps. But only if they belonged to a hot guy. On my recent venture into Perdido Keys, Florida, I met this boy and I left with his hat. I still have it. It is an Ole Miss hat and it is sitting on my desk. As I said before, I have this thing for guys' baseball hats.)  
  
"We're tired." Molly yawned widely, her bangles knocking against one another and making clinking noises that were oddly pleasing to the ear. (an. I think I've said before how I like when jewelry clinks together and makes noise)  
  
"Why?" ZigZag, who had taken an odd liking to the mildly dark-skinned young woman in their midst, asked without thinking.  
  
"You NEVER ask a girl why." Molly informed him darkly, her eyes narrowed mysteriously. "NEVER ask her why about anything."  
  
And she turned and left the boys in the dust, with the girls gathered up around her. They took their shovels and sauntered after Pendanski to their dig site for the day.   
  
The digging was long and hard once again that day. It seemed even hotter, this day, than yesterday.   
  
When the girls were finished, they went back. As Stephanie was the first girl done once more, she was the first to race back to the camp. She decided to forego a shower (as she usually did) and she went straight to the rec-room to flirt up a desert storm (and those are not good).   
  
Ayla and Emily were the next girls done. They strolled back to the camp leisurely, dragging their shovels behind them in the dirt. Ayla took Squid's hat and put it on backwards, smoothing down her sweaty hairline.   
  
"You really do have a crush on him, don't you?" Emily commented mildly as they deposited their shovels on the pile of other discarded shovels.   
  
"Who? Squid?" Ayla scoffed, shaking her head. "Nah. He's cute, yeah. But I don't know him. How can you have a crush on somebody that you don't even know? That's like me and Katie claiming that we love Benji and Joel Madden and that we're going to marry them." (AN. There's this little inside thing with me and a girl named Katie, who plays rhythmic guitar in our band. Last year, I wrote this story in a notebook about our band and Katie and I ended up marrying those amazingly drop-dead gorgeous mouth-watering twins from Good Charlotte. Yeah, can you tell I wish it really happened?)  
  
"So does that mean you like him or not?" Emily asked, trying to discern a logical meaning from Ayla's long-winded speech. (AN. I tend to do that sometimes, have you noticed??)  
  
"I might learn to like him. I think he is funny and cute and sweet, but that does not mean that I have a crush on him." Ayla explained in words she figured her best friend would understand.   
  
"Oh. Okay." Emily nodded as they retrieved their towels from their tent and went to the open-air showers.   
  
They waited until the line of waiting guys diminished, then they stood guard for one another while they took showers in the in the indecent shower stalls.   
  
After they had showered, they wrapped their towels around their bodies and started at a quick walk back to their nearby tent.   
  
"Hey sexy," Somebody called to the two girls, wrapped in the huge white towels they'd been provided with.   
  
"Take it off!" Somebody else called, approaching the two girls. They glared at him with intense dislike, realizing immediately that they were in no position to defend themselves if the boy decided he wanted something from them.  
  
"Hey, leave them alone." Squid stepped immediately in between the hardly-dressed girls and the menacing thug. (AN. Thug. I LOVE that word!! Hahahahaahahahaha!)  
  
Both Ayla and Emily looked at their unexpected savior with surprise. Squid's nostrils flared out because he was mad, and his eyes flashed dangerously.  
  
The guy, with obvious things on his mind, backed off immediately. Squid apparently had a reputation around camp. Squid turned to the two girls who shared his counselor, his eyes immediately seeking the face of the one that wore his hat. (AN. Hey, I can't help it. I'm writing the story, so of course I'm gonna make Squid have a crush on me!! If you were in my position, wouldn't you do the same?)   
  
"Are you guys okay?" He demanded, his shaggy hair falling into his dark, serious eyes.   
  
"We're not guys." Ayla informed him matter-of-factly. (AN. It's a bad habit of mine, saying that. Big on women's suffrage and all that, u know.)  
  
"Well, are you GIRLS okays?" He changed his sentence immediately, realizing what to do to get past her annoyance.   
  
"We're fine." Emily assured him quickly before Ayla could speak. "Thanks for stepping in like that. Obviously we're in no position to defend ourselves."   
  
"Yeah, about that." Squid blushed slightly. "I wouldn't walk around in just towels anymore. It's kind of provocative to the type of guys here. Why don't you guys go get dressed or something?" He suggested.  
  
"We're not guys!" Ayla called over her shoulder as Emily dragged her up the steps and into their tent.   
  
"Well that was sufficiently awkward." Emily complained as they hurriedly got dressed before any further incidences could occur.  
  
"It was pretty nice of Squid to step in when he did though, wasn't it?" Ayla mused thoughtfully, fastening her bra and pulling on her tight white t-shirt that said CIA (cute intelligent angel) on it. (AN. That is the shirt I am wearing right now, as a matter of fact.)  
  
"And you were perfectly rude to him for trying to help us." Emily chided her friend, levitating on her back as she combed her hair.   
  
"I was not." Ayla complained, summoning a comb to her from Erin's cot.   
  
"Whatever. I'm not going to argue with you about it." Emily assured her friend, dropping her own comb to the cot beneath her. "What do you want to do? Go to the rec room and watch Stephanie at her attempts to snag a guy?"  
  
"Nah. I'm done with making fun of her for the day." Ayla shrugged, stretching out across her cot comfortably. "After she fell into her hole this afternoon, I used all my wisecracks up. There is no more smart alec remarks from me today."  
  
"Suit yourself. I still got a suitable amount up my sleeve." Emily shrugged, climbing to her feet. "I'll be in the rec room if you need me. Stay out of trouble, okay? And don't provoke anybody else, all right?"  
  
"Would I do that?" Ayla demanded innocently. Emily snorted derisively and left the tent. Ayla waited a suitable amount of time, then went searching for Squid. She found him going to his tent. He'd already showered. He was wearing his jumpsuit, and the top was down. He wore no shirt. (AN. Okay, let's take a moment to drool over that beautifully chiseled chest………sigh) His wet hair was stuck to his forehead.   
  
"Hey," he greeted her with a small smile. The sight of his baseball cap, a couple sizes too big, perched on Ayla's dark hair always amused him.   
  
"Hi." She mumbled, falling into step beside him. "Where are we going?"  
  
"I'm going back to my tent." Squid said, giving her a funny look with one eyebrow arched. "I dunno where you're going."  
  
"That's not funny." Ayla slapped him playfully on the shoulder.   
  
He laughed at her silly attempt to hurt him. "All right then." He said, shaking back his wet hair. "Where do you want to go?"  
  
"I don't care." She shrugged, slipping her hand into his. He stared at the tiny hand in his in surprise, then smiled and wrapped his fingers around hers. (AN. I have this bad habit of doing that, too. Randomly holding people's hands. I did it once at a party and got a guy mad at me for months because he just wanted to be friends. He didn't understand that I hug, and kiss, and hold hands with all my friends, even if they're girls. I am just a very affectionate person.) "I just want to talk."  
  
"About what?" He had no idea what she could possibly want to talk about.  
  
"Thanks for helping me and Emily out earlier today." She thanked him, changing topics immediately.   
  
"Uh………you're welcome." He replied as they strolled leisurely around the camp grounds. "I just wouldn't go around dressed like that anymore."  
  
"Okay." Ayla said, catching sight of Emily and Molly emerging from the rec room. She took her hand from his. "See you later." And she slipped off to rejoin her friends.   
  
Squid watched her go with obvious confusion.

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Hey, I am totally sorry for the total weirdness of this chapter. It has absolutely no point. It's midnight and I have had a really weird day. I think I'm drunk or something………not really, I just feel it. It's an odd feeling, like you can't focus your mind on what you want it to focus on. I suppose I just need to get something to drink and try to go to bed. Oh, by the way, my birthday is coming up and I WANT REVIEWS!! Okay? Savvy?? Sweet. Hugs and kisses!! Byeness!!


	6. failing powers

Hey hey!! Sorry that it has been so long since I last updated, and once more I am sorry for the total randomness of that last chapter, because it is not important to the story at all in any way, form, or fashion. It was brought to my attention (though by who I do not remember because it was a while ago) that putting author's notes in the middle of the story takes away from the whole thing. And, as I just re-read my last chapter in this story, I realized that there were a LOT of author's notes inserted everywhere and randomly. So I am sorry for that and I will try not to take away from my story anymore. Thank you once more to whoever it was who gave me such wonderful advice. Anyways, my birthday was almost two months ago, and I am very excited because I can drive now. Please review for me, because reviews make me very happy. Being happy is a good thing. Being sad is not.

The next morning, Ayla woke with a splitting headache. Her mouth was dry, her eyes watery (because she had slept in her contacts), and her arm sore from digging the previous couple of days. With great difficulty, she dragged herself out of bed and into her clothes. She tossed her hair up into two messy buns and tied her chucks on.

"You look like you have the world's biggest hangover." Molly informed her in a matter-of-fact voice, deftly braiding her dark hair.

"I feel it." Ayla sighed, sinking down onto the edge of the cot. Then her stomach gave a particularly loud rumble. "I'm starving."

"Me too." Stephanie agreed.

"Well, honey flavored tortillas, here we come!" Emily said with sarcastic cheerfulness, tying her hair back into a ponytail. The seven of them exited their tent.

The boys were waiting for them in line. Squid regarded Ayla with a curious look. She hadn't spoken to him since yesterday afternoon when he'd been coming back from the showers.

"Hey, you want me to carry your shovel for you?" ZigZag asked Molly politely. She positively beamed as she handed her shovel to him, and batted her long, thick eyelashes at him the whole way to their dig site.

Erin began to hum 'As I went down to the river to pray' from the movie O' Brother Where Art Thou, that they had sung in eighth grade chorus. The other girls began to hum their specific parts as well. Erin and Stephanie were sopranos. Emily and Ayla were second sopranos. Kali, Molly, and Bethany were altos. (AN. Just have to say this real quick, Bethany was never actually in chorus so I don't know what she was………probably not an alto but oh well)

When Pendanski brought their lunch in the truck, they all sat around in a circle together to eat their sandwiches and apples and chocolate chip cookies.

"Anybody want my cookie?" Bethany offered without much enthusiasm. She was allergic to chocolate, and couldn't eat it.

"I do!" Armpit and Stephanie both shouted at once. Bethany handed it to Armpit, who blushed and looked at Stephanie. "Half it?" He suggested.

"Sure!" She grinned broadly as he broke the cookie in half and passed her the decidedly larger piece. She popped it in her mouth whole. "Fanks!" She mumbled.

Erin leaned over to Kali. "Try to use your power now." She suggested.

Kali screwed up her face in concentration. A lone cloud scudded across the sky. If anything, her powers were getting weaker.

"There's something definitely fishy about this place." Emily whispered under her breath to her friends. "And we'd better get to the bottom of it before our powers completely disappear!"

"Are your powers disappearing too?" Kali asked in confusion.

They all nodded.

"I tried to summon my crate over to me yesterday morning because I was too lazy to go over to it to get dressed, and I could only make it come halfway across the tent."

"I tried to fly across the tent and I fell right out of the air." Emily shuddered at the memory, rubbing the bruises on her knees to prove it.

The others all had similar stories, and they nodded.

"That settles it." Bethany said decisively. "We'll do some detective work tonight!"

"What about sleep?" Stephanie complained in a whiny voice. The others just ignored her completely.

"Hey, what are ya'll talking about over there?" Armpit called suspiciously.

"Girl stuff!" They lied, and went back to digging their holes.

That night, after the rest of the camp had gone to bed in order to get up early the following morning, the girls dressed themselves all in black and crept silently out of their tent.

Hope you liked the chappy!! Remember to review for me, not only because you love me but also because it is my birthday in two weeks minute a day!! Well, it is while I'm writing it. Once I've gotten it posted it'll be like two weeks minus two or three days………oh well. Hope you enjoyed the chappy!! Loves!! Kisses!! Byeness!! 


	7. a night of detective work

Hey hey!! I am very, very sorry about my lack of updating. I apologize profusely. My friends that are actually in this story have been getting onto me, so I am finally updating. And guess what!! I am updating all my stories!! So if you read any of my other stories, I have updated them!! Or will before this night is over, because I am still working obviously. Okay, I don't own camp Greenlake of any of the author's characters (I can't spell his name work beans!!) I also do not own any of the female characters except for Ayla, as that is myself. However, I am copywriting the other characters because they are my friends and I am selfish so I will not share. Mwuahahahah!! I am the epitome of evil!! ……… not really

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The night was decidedly cool as they crept across the moon-drenched, baked dried-out ground. They all wore black, and (just for fun) they had drawn intricate designs on their faces with black eyeliner.

"What exactly are we looking for?" Kali asked in a quiet voice, the spirals on her cheeks moving as she spoke.

"I'm not really sure." Bethany, who had proposed the night of detective work, admitted with a little shrug.

"Then let's go back to the tent and go back to bed!" Stephanie whined, tugging on Molly's sleeve hopefully. Molly shrugged her off indifferently.

"First of all, what could possibly make our powers diminish?" Emily, always the most logical of everybody, spoke out.

"Maybe the effects from that lightning are finally starting to wear off?" Ayla suggested mildly. Even though it wasn't black, she was wearing Squid's hat pulled down over her dark hair.

"Not after so many years of having it. No way." Emily shook her head, biting her lip.

"You know, maybe after we did that whole thing in Panama, God decided we weren't worthy of our powers anymore and He's slowly been draining them from us." Erin suggested worriedly.

"Don't be silly." The others said impatiently.

"That whole illegal thing could have SOMETHING to do with our losing our powers though," Emily admitted. "Can anybody think of anything that happened that might have caused it?"

They all thought back.

Flashback:

The seven girls were sitting around Kali's pool the summer before their junior year. They were all wearing bathing suits and eating ice cream cones that they'd just purchased from the ice cream truck making its rounds.

"I'm totally bored." Bethany groaned, licking a dollop of her vanilla ice cream before it fell off onto her leg. "We should do something."

"How about a road trip!" Ayla exclaimed excitedly, sitting straight up in her lawn chair and allowing her Shonen Jump fall to the deck. "To Panama City in Florida!"

"Uh, duh. We can't." Kali said pointedly. "None of us has an unrestricted license, and besides, nobody has a car big enough to fit us all in."

"Hello! We can so take my step-dad's van. It's plenty big enough to seat all of us." Ayla said, folding her arms and picking up her magazine.

"My mom would never let me go." Emily shook her head.

"Mine either." Bethany agreed. "You know how totally overprotective she is, even though she HAS gotten better lately………"

"C'mon, don't be so narrow-minded!" Ayla exclaimed. "We can just tell our parents we're going camping for a week in the Smokies. None of our parents would object to that. They'd think we were just going to make some stupid spoof on the Blair Witch Project, and then they'd think it was a learning experience."

"But hotel rooms and condos are really expensive in Panama City," Kali pointed out, "And we don't have all that much money, even though we've all been working all summer."

"My step-mom has a summer home up there about a mile outside of the city limits." Molly spoke up. "I can swipe the keys from her and we can stay there."

"Yay!" Ayla cheered, jumping up and dancing around the hot deck. "Road trip to the beach! Road trip to the beach!"

"Calm down, we're not going for sure yet." Stephanie said with a grin, giving Ayla a shove. She landed in the pool and splashed everybody else.

"Hey!" They cried.

Despite doubts, they all ended up being able to sneak away. They met at Ayla's mom's house before dawn Sunday morning and they set off. They reached the beach-front home late that afternoon and immediately went grocery shopping.

They passed a sign in town that immediately caught Kali's eye: FASHION SHOW ON SATURDAY; TOP DESIGNERS. Since Kali was an aspiring designer herself, she immediately began to drool.

"We have to go." She said adamantly.

"It's already sold out." Molly pointed out, indicating the smaller print on the sign.

"We're going!" Kali insisted.

So when Saturday rolled around, Erin slipped through the back wall in all black and let them in through the back door. Ayla used her ability to swipe seven backstage passes, pretending they were crew.

They soon stumbled across a locked door labeled do-not-enter.

"What do you think is in there?" Ayla, nosy as always, asked in a low whisper.

"Let's find out!" Stephanie exclaimed, shoving Erin through the wall. She opened the door and they all slipped inside, shutting the door behind them. The room was pitch dark, and they fumbled for a moment for the light. Bethany finally found it, and she flicked them on.

The most expensive gowns in the southern part of America were hanging on delicate hangers, protected by sheer bags. The girls began to drool at the sight of such pretty dresses.

"They're so gorgeous!" Emily breathed, fingering a silky-satiny material between her fingers.

Kali had little hearts in her eyes. "It wouldn't hurt for me to try one on, would it? Just for a teeny little second?"

"No way." Erin said immediately, her voice firm. "I came along on this unsupervised and unauthorized and illegal road trip, and I even helped in sneaking into the fashion show. But there is no way we can afford to repair these dresses if we mess them up."

"Just for a second?" Kali was already taking a satiny red gown from it's hanger and zipping it up around her body. She was breathtaking.

"Oh my god! You're so pretty!" Bethany gushed, choosing a diamond-encrusted pink gown for herself, completely with ruffly bow.

Pretty soon, they were all trying on the gowns. Even Erin gave in and tried on a sapphire blue gown with sapphires in the trim.

"Yeah, the gowns are in here. Let me find the one we're looking for real quick." A technician's voice floated through the locked door.

All seven girls froze. Their own clothes were scattered about the floor, and they were all still wearing the invaluable designer gowns.

They immediately snatched up their clothing as a key slid into the lock. Ayla blasted the window outward with one wave of her hand. They could hear the startled exclamation of the technician as he struggled to unlock the door.

The girls flung themselves into the van and peeled away. They raced immediately back to Molly's step-mom's summer house, where they took off the gowns and hid them away in the back of their closets.

"What are we going to do?" Erin moaned. "I told you something bad was going to happen!"

A knock on the door interrupted their discussion. Everybody immediately jumped and their minds raced to the worst possible conclusions.

"Just calm down. They couldn't possibly have found us." Molly said irritably, climbing to her feet and going to the door.

The police weren't very nice once they'd forced their way into the house. It seems they'd been caught on surveillance camera, and were red-handed. The police confiscated the gowns and the girls were taken to the Panama City police station.

Their parents were furious to find out that they'd been arrested. They were even more furious to find out that they were in Panama City without permission. They all took the fastest flight there, and boy were those girls in trouble!

They were flown back to their hometown in Tennessee, where their trial was held. They were found guilty, but because of no previous crimes, they were given the choice of jail or a place called Camp Greenlake.

Of course they'd chosen Greenlake.

End Flashback:

All of the girls shook their head. "Nope." They agreed with one another. "Nothing we did on vacation could have caused this."

"There's only one explanation for this, then." Ayla said grimly in a dark, mysterious voice. The eyeliner in curlicues about her eyelashes did nothing to lighten the mood.

They all stared at her. "What?" They urged.

"This place is cursed." She announced grandly.

"What?" "Don't be stupid." "You're totally losing it." "I think we all need sleep."

So they all headed back to the tent. They changed out of their black clothes into their pajamas, and then they crawled into bed.

Ayla couldn't, however, disregard her hunch that Camp Greenlake was cursed.

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Okay, that was a pretty pointless chappie but oh well, at least I posted, right? No more postie nazi!! Okay, I still have a couple more stories to update before I go to bed and it's 10 here now so I gotta go!! Hope you like it!! Review or me and my friends will use our special powers to hunt you down!! (JK : ) ) 


	8. the scientific method

I apologize profusely for not updating for like a whole freaking year. My friend Erin (yes, the one in this story) has been nagging me to update so I finally am. I've just been busy with work. Erin and I work at the same place. Kali is getting a job at Walgreen's. Bethany and Stephanie just finished with our school play, The Music Man. Bethany was Amarillis (sp?) and Stephanie was in the chorus. Molly just had her three month anniversary with her Romanian boyfriend Mike. Emily………well there hasn't been really much happening with Emily lately, I don't think. Anyway, ON WITH THE STORY!

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The next morning, the seven girls were exhausted from their night of "sleuthing." They rolled out of bed, yanked their jumpsuits on over their wrinkled jimjams, and jammed their breakfast tortillas into wide mouths.

The day of working went relatively easily, now that their muscles were getting larger and their hands were becoming permanently calloused. Molly and Stephanie were the first two done, so they walked back to camp together with their shovels slung easily over their shoulders.

"I haven't talked to Mike on the phone in two weeks!" Molly complained sadly.

"Yeah, well, I haven't talked to Cory……… I mean Alex……… John in three." Stephanie pointed out.

After they had all showered, the girls regrouped in their tent. They all crowded onto three cots. Emily, Ayla, and Stephanie sat cross-legged on one, with Bethany laying sprawled out in front of them. Kali and Erin sat on the one across from them, and Molly sat with her legs stretched out on the floor in between.

"This is getting out of hand." Emily's blue eyes narrowed in annoyance. She concentrated very hard and managed to rise a couple of inches off the cot before crashing back down.

"Hey!" Stephanie complained as the cot rocked precariously. Bethany tumbled off into the floor.

"Ouch." She said sarcastically.

"What about the rest of ya'll?" Emily asked, ignoring both Stephanie and Bethany. "What about your powers?"

Ayla held up a hand and beckoned to her hairbrush with one finger. It jumped enough to tumble out of her crate, but then it lay motionless on the floor. Erin tried to jam her foot through the floor, but it just made a resounding, hollow boom. Kali willed the clouds to come, but it remained just as sunnily cloudless as before. Molly held up her hands and tried to make her claws extend, but nothing happened. The scars of her healed wounds remained closed. Bethany tried to make one of Ayla's notebook's catch on fire, while Stephanie tried to freeze it. The notebook remained a regular old notebook.

"See! I told you guys this place was cursed!" Ayla crossed her arms over her plain white tank top sulkily.

"I know that sounds like a completely ridiculous notion," Erin said seriously, a loose strand of blonde hair hanging over her face. She brushed it back in annoyance. "But I think we might want to think about Ayla's idea."

"Yeah." Ayla nodded.

"This place isn't cursed. Curses aren't real." Stephanie said matter-of-factly.

"Yeah right." Bethany grumbled under her breath, drawing her knees up to her chin. "Curses are too real."

"Let's just look at the facts. Go through this scientifically." Molly suggested reasonably. "Okay, were everybody's powers fine before we were sent here?"

There was a general murmur of assent.

"So when did our powers start failing?" Molly continued.

"When we got here." Kali admitted. The others reluctantly agreed with her.

"So it would probably be safe to assume that our powers are diminished because of something we've encountered here." Molly said in conclusion.

"But it doesn't necessarily have to be a curse." Emily was quick to point out. "It could be because of a person, or the food we've been eating, all the back-breaking labor we've been doing here, or even something in the water!"

"If you don't believe in curses, then why would you believe that somebody here has the power to take our powers away?" Bethany demanded bitterly. Then she added under her breath, "Don't know why you'd have trouble believing in curses anyway, what with us receiving super-natural powers from a strike of lightning."

Emily stuck out her tongue at Bethany.

"It's not the work we're doing either, because I worked this hard back at home with my dad's landscaping business and there was nothing wrong with my powers then." Stephanie pointed out.

"So our only logical explanations are that there's something in the food, or Camp Greenlake really is cursed."

"So how do we find out which one it is?" Ayla asked uncertainly.

"We've got to search for some evidence." Molly said confidently.

"Uh……… duh! We did that last night." Kali rolled her eyes. "We didn't find anything, remember?"

"We're not going to find evidence of a curse just by walking outside and sniffing around." Molly answered impatiently. "There's going to be something written down somewhere, in a file or in a book."

"And there's only one place in this whole god-forsaken camp with any kind of books at all." Erin said darkly.

"The warden's cabin." Molly nodded.

"So we have to sneak in there? How are we gonna manage that?" Stephanie demanded incredulously.

"I dunno." Molly admitted.

"Let's see if the guys know anything." Emily suggested, rising from the cot. The end Ayla and Stephanie were on tipped slowly toward the ground, and the two of them quickly hopped up.

"We can't let them know what we're planning though," Bethany exclaimed, putting a hand on Emily's arm to stop her. "One of them might let it slip without meaning to."

"They'd probably do it on purpose." Ayla grumbled, rolling her blue eyes.

"We're not going to tell them what we're up to." Emily shook her head. "Just casually bring up random questions."

So they followed Emily down the steps and over to the boys D-tent. She stopped short, then looked at the others. "I don't wanna go first!" She admitted.

Molly and Stephanie pushed to the front of the little group and ascended the steps. "Hey, are you guys in there?"

There was a pause, then a scuffling sound within. X-ray appeared at the tent flap, looking confused. "Hey ya'll, what's up?"

"We were wondering if ya'll wanted to play a big game of Spoons." Ayla suggested. (AN. Spoons is the best game in the entire world! Best if you don't play it with knives, though. I cut my hand once.)

"Sure. Let's sit outside so there's plenty of room." X-Ray motioned to the rest of the boys and everybody gathered outside to play.

"It's so hot here." Bethany complained meaningfully, dealing out the cards. "I wish there were some clouds, or it would rain, or something."

"It never rains here." Squid shook his head, glancing over at Ayla. She didn't have his baseball cap with her. Otherwise he would have stolen it back. "Hasn't for nearly fifty years, or so Mom tells us."

"And there's never a single cloud in the sky." Armpit added in, shading his eyes and looking wistfully up at the sky. "Sure would be nice if there was, though."

"Why doesn't it rain?" Molly pretended to be only marginally interested.

ZigZag shrugged. "Who knows. Definitely not us. It's just the way it is."

Ayla and Emily exchanged a long look. They were both thinking it: CURSED.

"So do we ever get to see the warden that runs this place?" Erin asked politely, passing on the cards to Kali, who in turn passed them on to Bethany.

"Who? Ms. Walker?" Magnet shook his head. "Nah. She only comes out when you find something while you're digging. Something good."

"Something good? What, is she searching for buried treasure or something?" Stephanie joked.

The boys chuckled, but it was half-heartedly. "Sure seems like it. She freaks out whenever anybody finds anything, then makes them dig in the same spot for the rest of th week to see if there's anything else down there." Squid said.

"What exactly is 'something good'?" Bethany asked.

"Last time she freaked out about a little handheld mirror. It had something engraved on the back, but it had been all worn away." X-ray explained. "I guess she likes anything girlie."

The girls looked at one another, already forming plans.

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Okay, I know this one was relatively short but I have to go eat dinner. But I have no homework so I am going to try to finish updating some more of my stories once I've eaten.

Kali: (wearing blindfold and holding a turkey feather on a pin) Pin the tail on the turkey!

Erin: YEEEEEOOOOW! I AM NOT THE TURKEY!

Kali: Hey the turkey talks!


	9. secret espionage mission

Okay, definitely been a while since I updated…I guess I'll tell you what is going on in the real world with all of us…my pink streaks are entirely gone. Then I got blonde highlights in my hair, but that was a while ago so they're going away too. Then I got blue tips, but that's starting to fade as well. Soon, my hair might actually be normal! My seventeenth birthday is August 10! I'm so excited! Erin turned seventeen on June 16. Kali will be seventeen on July 26. Bethany turned sixteen on May 2. She and I have gotten a whole lot closer this year. Like we weren't that close last year and now we are. It's pretty cool. Anyway, Emily's sixteenth birthday is August 28. She's coming over to my house later today. She's coming to my family's fish fry with me. Stephanie is doing good too. We're actually friends again, I think. She's the new guard captain, so we're spending a lot of time together. Man, she has got stamina! We do a campus run every time we have practice. All of us have to take breaks and walk sometimes. Not Steph. She just keeps going and going and going…she's the energizer bunny or something! She'll be seventeen October 7. I haven't seen Molly lately. That makes me sad. The last time I saw her was when we went to the Ren Fair together. She and Mike are still together. It is cool. It's been almost a year, I think. Maybe not. I don't remember! Anyway, so I've rambled for a long time now. I'll shut up and let you get to reading the story.

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The girls put their plan into motion the very next day. They set about digging their holes like everybody else. They didn't even complain as much because they were concentrating so hard on what they had to do.

Just before the lunch truck pulled up, Emily and Ayla pulled two objects from inside their orange jumpsuits. They discreetly dropped the objects into their holes and slightly covered them up with dirt.

Mr. Sir pulled the lunch truck up and got out. "Come on, line up." He grumbled. They all dropped their shovels and headed toward the truck. When Emily dropped her shovel, it made a clang.

"What's that?" Mr. Sir demanded, his eyes going wide.

"I dunno, looks like some sort of old compact mirror." Emily shrugged. It was actually Bethany's compact mirror, and it was designed to appear as though it was from the 1800s.

Mr. Sir snatched it out of her hands and began examining it sharply. He couldn't hide the excitement on his face.

"Is that good?" Ayla asked casually, picking up her object and holding it up to the light. "I found something like that earlier this morning."

Mr. Sir jumped nearly a foot and hurried over to her hole. "What is it?" He panted breathlessly.

Ayla turned it over in her hands. "It looks to me like some kind of lipstick tube. The lipstick is all melted out though. I think it was bright red, but it's hard to tell."

Mr. Sir looked like this was the best day of his life. He whipped a walkie talkie from his belt and pressed a button. "Lou, we've got something. Two somethings."

The walkie talkie crackled. "I'll be right there." Said a feminine voice, unmistakably belonging to the warden. The girls all exchanged excited looks, then quickly tried to hide it so nobody noticed.

A minute later, a curly haired woman in a cowboy hat pulled up. Lou Walker, warden of Camp Greenlake. She got out of her car and strode over to them, her cowboy boots crunching on the sun-baked earth. She took first the mirror and then the lipstick tube in her hands and examined them thoroughly. Everybody else held their breath.

Finally, Lou Walker smiled. "Mr. Sir, take these two girls back to camp. Give them extra shower tokens, and a snack." She commanded.

"Yes, ma'am. Right away." Mr. Sir nodded. "Come on, get in the truck." He said to Ayla and Emily. The two girls followed him into his truck, and they drove away toward camp. They could hear Ms. Walker organizing a more thorough search of the area.

Mr. Sir dropped them off at camp, then returned immediately to the digging. He didn't want to miss an opportunity to yell and shout.

"Okay, come on." Emily said in an undertone as Mr. Sir's truck disappeared. They hurried over to the warden's cabin and tried the door. "Locked." Emily stamped her foot in annoyance.

Ayla hurried over to the window. It was open only a crack. She pried the screen loose, then pushed the window up. She scrambled through the window onto a desk, sending a ceramic coffee mug holding pens to the floor. It shattered.

"Way to go." Emily rolled her eyes as Ayla unlocked the door and let her in.

"Shut up." Ayla said carelessly. "Now we have to hurry." She bent down and began to pick up all the fallen pens. She put them in a new cup and threw the shards of the broken one away. She hoped the warden wouldn't notice.

They began searching. There were no books visible in the cabin's main room. So they ambled through the door and into the warden's bedroom. It was a nice bedroom, with a comfortable looking bed and a television.

And a bookshelf.

"There!" Emily pointed, and they scrambled over the bed to the bookshelf. There were only about thirty books on the shelves, so they didn't have any trouble at all locating which one they wanted.

"Here we go." Ayla mumbled to herself, pulling one from the shelf. It was titled 'Greenlake, the rise and fall'. "This sounds informative."

She flipped it open and the two of them read silently to themselves. They were both fast readers, so they flipped page after page.

"This is it. This is the one we need." Emily said firmly, tucking the book under her arm.

"You don't think the warden will notice if it's missing?" Ayla asked worriedly as they left the bedroom.

"Does she really seem like the kind of person who reads often?" Emily asked dryly. Then she stopped. "What is this?"

They had come across a series of video surveillance. Emily reached up and rewound a tape of the warden's cabin. Quite clearly, the girls saw themselves breaking and entering and stealing a book.

"Good thing we found this." Ayla mumbled as Emily deleted the footage. They found some sound clips of them speaking and deleted them as well.

Then Emily left the cabin through the front door, and Ayla locked it behind her. Then she scrambled back onto the desk, careful not to knock anything over this time, and out the window. She pulled the window down till it was only open a crack, then fitted the screen over it. The cabin looked exactly how they had found it.

The two of them escaped back to their tent.

"We should hide the book," Ayla suggested as they came in. "Just in case she gets suspicious and checks the tent."

"How about here?" Emily asked, lifting up a mattress and pulling the lining back. She slid the book inside the lining. It was gross, but the book was completely hidden.

"Excellent." Ayla agreed. Then they laid down on their cots to wait for the others to return from digging.

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Okay, it was short, but hopefully that won't matter because I should be keeping my stories updated now. Should be, but of course that doesn't mean I will. Sometimes it just gets hard to remember, you know? Anyway, review!

Stephanie: (pointing out window) Hey! That dude owes me money!

Erin: Stephanie, that's a cow.

Stephanie: Oh.


	10. action

Okay, I just got back from a cruise through the Caribbean with my marching band, and I wrote on the nice long eleven hour drive to and from Jacksonville, Florida where we boarded and disembarked our wonderful, amazing cruise ship. So here ya go.

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The other five girls returned from their holes a little bit later. They were especially exhausted, and just a little bitter.

"It was for the greater good of us all." Ayla reasoned.

"Let's just find out if this hell hole is cursed or not." Molly said briskly, picking up the book. It was heavy and dusty, as though it hadn't been used in a very long time.

The girls silently read each page to themselves. It was a long and tedious task, as they all read at different paces and had to pause to let others catch up. They finally finished the chapter, and the book was discarded into Erin's lap.

"So it stopped raining after they killed Kissin' Kate Barlow's black lover?" Stephanie demanded. "That sounds like a curse if I ever heard one."

"It would make sense that the curse preventing it to rain here is interfering with our powers." Emily pointed out.

"So if Kate cast the curse on the town, then how can we get her to change it?" Kali wondered aloud.

"She's been dead for forever!" Bethany exclaimed. "The only way we'd ever get to even talk to her is to make a time machine and travel back in time."

"I doubt that we could manage that, even with our powers." Molly answered dryly.

"Maybe a séance would be better." Ayla suggested.

"There're several flaws in that plan." Emily pointed out, leaning back on her hands. "One: to have the séance, we'd have to know exactly where Kate was buried. And the book told us that she could have died anywhere in this desert, but nobody knows. We'd never find her body. And two: even if we did find her, how would we ever persuade her to lift the curse?"

"If we had a time machine," Bethany pointed out. "We could go back in time and keep her lover from being killed."

"I don't think it's a good idea to alter history like that," Erin shook her head, her sweaty blonde hair sticking to her forehead and neck.

"Well there's no way we could build a time machine anyway, so it's not a problem." Stephanie snapped irritably.

"The séance is probably out best bet." Molly pointed out logically.

"Any ideas on how to persuade Kate to lift the curse?" Emily asked archly.

They were all, unfortunately, stumped.

The seven of them pondered their unnatural predicament for the rest of the day and for the rest of the week.

During the middle of the night one evening several days later, Kali sat straight up on her rickety cot. "Hey you guys!" She shouted. The girls reluctantly rubbed their eyes and tried to wake up.

"What is it?" Erin demanded in annoyance. She did NOT appreciate being woken up in the middle of the night by shouting.

"What if, when we raise Kate Barlow's spirit, we give her a peace offering and tell her it's from the Warden, since her family is the on to blame?" Kali asked eagerly.

There was a long pause as everybody mulled it over.

"Kali, you're an absolute genius!" Ayla declared.

Kali beamed.

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During the next couple of days, the seven girls filched as much food from the mess hall as they dared. Bethany, the tiniest out of all of them, managed to sneak into the Warden's cabin and stole a bouquet of fresh roses to use as their peace offering when they finally managed to raise Kate's spirit.

As the third day reached midnight, the seven girls, loaded down with cans of food and dull water canteens, crept out of Camp Greenlake.

"We've got to make good time tonight." Emily warned them all for about the hundredth time. "They'll be out looking for us first thing in the morning when they notice that we're gone."

Ayla cast a longing glance back at the camp, then they all headed off into the desert.

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Okay, there you go. Short, but rather important. Not much else to say now. Want a funny quote? Here's one from Stephanie.

Stephanie: When I was little, I put poo in my pockets.


	11. the seance

Sorry that this chapter took so long to get up. The next one will be up at the end of June, so look forward to it! And review please!

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"I'm so tired." Ayla whined as dawn crept over the eastern horizon. The seven of them had made at least three miles during the night.

Emily looked up at the rising sun. "We need to stop anyway." She said. "Everybody get something to eat and climb into a hole to sleep."

"What about all the poisonous lizards?" Bethany demanded.

"Don't get in a hole with one." Molly suggested, pulling a can of something out of her bag and popping the top.

So they all ate a little but of whatever they could and curled up in unoccupied holes to sleep through the incredibly hot and sunny day.

"I think I got sunburned." Kali complained as they got ready to head out again as the sun dipped down below the western horizon.

"Well, we were laying out in the sun all day." Erin said, drinking sparingly from her canteen, which was steadily becoming lighter.

"Come on, let's go." Stephanie called energetically, eager to get on their way. She was always full of energy. It exhausted the other girls just to watch her.

So they started walking further and further into the desert. It was at dawn when they stumbled across an overturned rowboat.

"Mary-Lou." Ayla read upside down. "Do you think this is where Kate Barlow could be buries?" She questioned eagerly.

"We can certainly try." Molly nodded.

"In any case, it's a place to get out of the sun." Emily said, pointing to a small entrance to the underside of the boat that the others would have missed.

They all scrambled inside. It was an incredibly tight fit. It was also extremely hot and very difficult to breathe. But it was shade.

The seven of them attempted to sleep throughout that hot, very long day. Nobody could sleep much, despite their terrible fatigue, because of the uncomfortable conditions.

Night finally fell and the girls crawled eagerly out of the cramped overturned boat. They ate and drank, then sat down to begin their séance.

"So, what do we do first?" Emily asked, directing her question to Ayla, who was the most knowledgeable of them all in this particular subject.

"Gives me the candle." Ayla commanded of Erin. The blonde girl pulled a thick, round candle that had been swiped form the Warden's cabin. Ayla struck a match and lit it.

Then she reached out and took the hands of Emily and Bethany, who were sitting on either side of her. The others caught on and they held hands, forming a circle.

"Kate Barlow," Ayla announced in a loud, clear voice. "Come into our circle. We wish to speak with you."

There was a brief breeze, and the candle flame danced. They all looked around at each other with wide eyes.

"It was just the wind." Emily whispered, breathless nonetheless.

"No," Ayla shook her head, her blue eyes very wide. "It's her. It's Kissin' Kate Barlow."

The candle flame danced again.

"Show yourself." Ayla commanded in a voice that sounded much braver than she actually felt.

"Why do you disturb my eternal rest?" A grave voice demanded, faint at first, but growing stronger by the second. A mist appeared above the candle, and it quickly took the form of a woman.

She was tall and broad-shouldered, in her late thirties or early forties. She had long blonde hair and a ghostly scowl on a face that had once been beautiful.

"You have cursed this land, and your curse is affecting our powers." Ayla explained. "We are here to ask that you lift the curse."

The ghost of Kissin' Kate Barlow threw back her head and laughed. The sound sent shivers down the girls' spines. "You want me to lift the curse?" The ghost repeated. "Just like that?" And she snapped her insubstantial fingers.

The girls nodded hopefully.

"It's not that simple." The ghost shook her head. "Even if I could, I wouldn't. The Walker family has wronged me. They killed my Sam." The apparition pointed to the overturned Mary-Lou.

"The Walker family begs for forgiveness." Bethany exclaimed, laying the stolen flowers before the candle in a type of offering.

The ghost looked at the bouquet. "The offer is appreciated, but I cannot lift the curse."

"Why not?" Kali burst out despairingly.

The ghost turned her dead eyes on Kali. "Because there are certain items I need to lift it. It is a very powerful curse, you must understand."

"What do you need?" Stephanie demanded eagerly. "We cab get anything you need, so long as we know what it is."

The ghost thought for a moment. "Holy water, a crucifix, wolfs bane, and rosemary oil." She listed. Then she looked up at the waxing moon in the night sky. "And the ceremony has to be performed on the full moon. You'd best hurry."

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I know it's short, but the plot is advancing. So, keep reading and please review!


	12. homecoming

**So. It's been like three years since I've updated this snazzy little piece of work. Go me. Procrastination to the max. Mostly I just forgot about it. So if you're still waiting for updates (most of my readers have probably given up all hope for me), congrats. **

**And for Frosted-Windows, who chose to leave me a nasty flame about the last chapter, to make holy water a person says a chant over it with a crucifix. You can make holy water anywhere there is water. And Wolf's Bane is a plant. It doesn't come from a wolf. So when you call me an idiot for writing things like this, you are only proving your own idiocy. Why don't you concentrate on your studies rather than flaming my story? Looks like you need it. **

As soon as the ghostly apparition of Kissin' Kate Barlow had disappeared, the girls gathered up their seance materials and started the long trek back to Camp Greenlake. Their minds were so full that they couldn't think straight.

They spent the night in holes that they passed, and reached Camp Greenlake again about mid-morning the next day. The outskirts of the camp was a sea of orange, the delinquent campers working on their daily holes.

The girls walked past B tent first, those boys working on the farthest outskirts of camp. The boys peeked over the tops of their holes and watched in wonderment. It was slightly unnerving.

"Why are they all staring at us?" Bethany whispered, draining the last of the water from her canteen with the promise of fresh water just on the horizon.

Stephanie shrugged. "It's because we're drop dead gorgeous."

"Yeah, that'll be it." Erin agreed sarcastically.

"Hey!" A shout rang out across the arid plain. Before any of the girls really registered what was happening, X-Ray had vaulted out of a hole about twenty feet away and sprinted toward them, followed by the other members of D-tent.

Molly grinned broadly when ZigZag skidded to a halt in the dust before them. "Hey boys." Even exhausted and dirty, she was a sex kitten.

"Where have you guys been?" Armpit demanded, panting slightly from his little run. "When you disappeared a few days ago, we all thought you'd died out in the desert or something!"

Emily looked around shiftily. "There was just some stuff that we had to do. We thought it would be better if we acted first and asked questions later."

"The Warden is _pissed_." X-Ray warned them. "When she found your empty tent the other day... whew. It was bad."

As if right on cue, a shrill voice accosted them. "Where have you seven been?" The Warden marched herself right over to them, followed closely by Mr. Sir and Dr. Pendanski. All three of them were angry, although Pendanski also looked a bit frightened. "You think you can just waltz around whenever you want?"

Ayla spoke up quickly, confidently. "We went out for a walk the other night, Mrs. Walker, ma'am. We weren't going to go far, because we were tired, but then we got lost. We've been trying to find our way back this whole time! We thought we were goners for sure!"

She looked and sounded so sincere that the Warden's mouth puckered over her front teeth for a moment. "Fine." She snapped. "You're lucky to be alive. And to remind you, in case you get another hankering for another midnight stroll through the desert, you'll get no shower tokens for today."

"What!" Stephanie exclaimed incredulously. "No shower tokens? But we've been traipsing through the desert for _four_ days! We smell awful!"

The Warden narrowed her hazel eyes at the blonde, whose hair was starting to look quite frightening indeed. "No shower tokens for two days." She replied coolly. "Now get back to your tent before I decide to punish you further." And she stalked off with Mr. Sir and Dr. Pendanski on either side of her.

"You just lied to the warden." Magnet accused.

Ayla shrugged. "Got us off easy, didn't it? Now somebody share their shower tokens with us. We're so smelly and gross."

"I'll say." Squid pretended to wave a nasty smell away from his nose.

"Hey!" Ayla protested, slapping his arm playfully.

He grabbed her arm and pulled her close, hugging her for a moment. "It's okay. I don't care if you smell." Then he quickly released her, embarrassed, and the boys returned to their holes.

Emily waggled her eyebrows at her best friend. "I think _somebody _has a little crush!" She sang under her breath.

"Whatever." Ayla rolled her eyes, but she couldn't help hoping.

They found their tent exactly as they had left it, and they all stripped off their disgusting orange jumpsuits and fell onto their cots in their panties and t-shirts. Even though it was quite hot and humid, the tent provided much-needed shade.

After about a twenty minute nap, Ayla got up off her cot and jammed her legs back into her jumpsuit.

"Where are you going?" Emily managed to raise her head a fraction of an inch off her pillow to ask.

"I'm starving. I'm going to go to the mess hall and see if I can wheedle any food out of the cooks." Ayla answered. "If I put on my cute, innocent little girl face, they just might shell out."

Emily let her head fall back. "Good luck with that."

Ayla shoved her feet into her sneakers without bothering to tie the glow-in-the-dark laces and left the tent. She was quite surprised to see Squid walking towards the tent. He smiled when he saw her and raised his hand in a sort of greeting.

She realized suddenly that she was still wearing his baseball cap, and she huffed and threw her arms over it in case he tried to steal it back.

He laughed at her as he got near. "I'm not coming to take the hat away. Hell, go ahead and keep it."

"Really?" She was surprised.

"Yeah, it's not a big deal." He answered, though she could tell by the slow blush that crept into his cheeks that it was. "I've got a million more like it back home."

"Oh. Well, thanks." She slowly let her arms drop back to her sides.

He scratched the back of his head awkwardly. "So, uh, I know you must be tired and all, but I was wondering if you wanted to go for a walk?"

"Sure!" She agreed quickly, almost too quickly.

His face broke out in a broad grin. "Awesome. Let's go."

They started strolling in no particular direction, not really speaking. When they reached the back of the mess hall, which was shady because of the sun's position, they sat down with their backs against the siding to rest.

"So where did you guys really go?" Squid asked, sitting so close to her that their shoulders were touching.

"We're not guys." She told him yet again, leaning a bit on him. "If you want to know the truth, we went out to the desert to find Kissin' Kate Barlow's unmarked grave."

He blinked at her, trying to determine if she was telling the truth or not. In the end, he seemed to decide to give her the benefit of the doubt. "And did you find Kissin' Kate Barlow's unmarked grave?"

"Yes, we did." Ayla answered without hesitation, nuzzling his shoulder a bit. He had just showered, so he smelled nice. "We had a seance and talked to her ghost."

He chuckled a little, obviously deciding she was just pulling his leg. "And what did her ghost tell you?"

"She told us that if we want to lift the curse on Greenlake, we have to bring her holy water, wolf's bane, rosemary oil, and a crucifix. Then she can reverse the curse. But the countercurse has to be performed on a full moon, which is only a week and a half away."

"Well, good luck with that." Squid failed to notice the seriousness of the situation. Instead, he adjusted his position and put his arm around her shoulders.

She snuggled closer despite the uncomfortable heat of the day, loving the way his arm felt around her. "Hey, Squid?" She asked.

"Yeah?" He looked down at her.

"Do you like me?"

He was taken aback by the question. "Well... yeah. I guess so. Clearly." He gestured to their intimate position.

"Good." She said, nestling into his embrace. "Sometimes boys are silly and don't make their intentions clear. I'm glad you're not one of those."

He smiled.

**So this chapter was a little short, a little whatever. I've got the next couple chapters already planned out, so bear with me. If you're still reading this, I thank you. **

**I guess, since I've been gone for almost three years or whatever, I'll update you a little on the characters in this story. We're all 20 now, about to turn 21. We graduated high school two years ago. **

**Bethany: she and I went to university together for one year, and then she dropped out. We lived together for a couple months, but then she moved away. There were rumors going around that she was a crack-whore stripper, but I'm pretty sure they're not true. She's teaching dance in a city about four hours away. **

**Erin: she's a junior at a religious college this year. She's a spanish major, and she still sings. She just moved into her first condo. Yay her! I was supposed to go see it last night but I was too tired as I live 45 minutes away now : (**

**Emily: she's a junior at a really prestigious college. She's super smart. She's been doing a lot of study abroad things. I think she might be in Africa right now or something. **

**Kali: She went to cosmetology school instead of college, and she graduated that a couple months ago. Now she's looking for a full-time job and thinking about going to a tech school to get a degree in business. She does my hair. I love her. **

**Molly: I haven't actually spoken with her in forever. I went with her about four months ago to get her second tattoo, but other than that I haven't seen her. I'm pretty sure she's still in school. **

**Stephanie: She's a junior in college, too. I'm not sure what she's studying. She's working like two or three jobs. She has an amazing boyfriend who bought her a puppy for valentine's day and is keeping it at his house because she lives in a dorm. **

**And Ayla (aka me): I'm a junior in uni too. English major with a double minor in art and writing. Yeah. That's me. **


	13. the stuff

**My goodness, I can't believe people are actually still reading this. I forget about it a lot and then randomly stumble across it. It's also funny because, since this story has taken place across years, I can see my writing improving. When I started this, I was a freshman in high school. Now I'll graduate college in a year. It's strange. But anyway, thanks to those of you who are still reading. I love you all!**

It was almost impossible for the seven of them to get up the following morning after having been so exhausted from their foray into the desert. Their limbs were heavy and their heads were clogged with sleep, but their grumbling stomachs finally got them out of bed.

"Think the Warden has calmed down a bit yet?" Erin wondered worriedly as they half-heartedly got dressed and brushed their hair.

Molly shrugged her suntanned shoulders. She was wearing a sports bra underneath her open jumpsuit today. "Who cares?"

"It matters, you know," Emily pointed out. "She's going to be keeping a close eye on us after that stunt we pulled, running away into the desert, and we somehow have to get all that stuff the ghost of Kate Barlow told us to bring to break the curse."

"And we've only got a week and a half to do it," Ayla pointed out glumly, pulling her hair into two tiny pigtails at the nape of her neck.

Stephanie slammed her fist into her open palm loudly, making them all jump. "There's only one thing for it," she told them firmly. "Some of us are going to have to act as decoys while the others find all that stuff."

"Come to think of it, _where_ will we find that stuff?" Kali wanted to know. "Holy water and Wolfsbane and... what were the other things?"

"A crucifix and Rosemary Oil," Bethany pointed out.

Ayla reached into her bag and pulled a crucifix with pink beads out of one of the pockets. "I can help with some of the stuff," she said. "My sister is Catholic, and she bought me this from Notre Dame when she went to France. We can use this to make Holy Water, too. We just need to say a chant or something over it."

"What kind of chant?" Kali asked eagerly.

Ayla shrugged. "Something Catholic, I guess. I'm sure we could find it online if we could gain access to a computer with internet."

"The Warden has a computer in her house," Emily pointed out. "I saw it when we broke in there and stole the book. It might have internet access."

"Okay, well that takes care of two things," Stephanie said. "But what about the Rosemary Oil and Wolfsbane?"

"I don't know about the Wolfsbane," Ayla explained. "But I think I know where we can find some Rosemary Oil. Bethany, do you still have that perfume I gave you for Christmas last year?"

Bethany looked up, slightly confused. "Yeah, I brought it with me..." She scrounged around in her crate until she found the bottle, which was half-empty by that point.

Ayla snatched it out of her hands and checked the contents label. "Aha!" she exclaimed triumphantly. "I thought so. Rosemary Oil is one of the main ingredients in this perfume! It's mixed with other stuff, of course, but I think it should work."

"What about the Wolfsbane?" Erin prompted.

Ayla shrugged. "Now that I know nothing about."

"I may be able to help with that," Molly spoke up. She pulled a paperback book out of her bag, called Herb Magic. "It may say something about it in here..." They all crowded around her as she flipped to the index, searching for the correct word. "Also known as Aconitum, Wolfsbane is a genus of flowering plant belonging to the buttercup family," Molly read. "These herbaceous perennial plants are chiefly natives of the mountainous parts of the northern hemisphere, growing in moisture retentive but well draining soils on mountain meadows."

"Well that's great," Bethany grumbled. "It grows in the mountains and here we are in the freaking desert!"

"We'll figure something out," Ayla promised her. "We have to."

Emily glanced at her watch. "Right now we'd better hurry or we're going to be late. The Warden is already pissed at us..."

So they vaulted out of their tent and ran to get their shovels and meager breakfasts.

After digging for the day, the girls trooped back as a group for once, feeling a strange new sense of camaraderie. They even linked arms, though they were far from festive, each one burdened with the weight of what they had to do.

"You know, even if we find some Wolfsbane and can lift the curse," Emily pointed out dejectedly as they lounged around their tent after showering. "We're going to end up going to jail anyway. The Warden won't believe that we happened to get lost twice for long periods of time."

"Maybe we can tell her the truth?" Kali suggested mildly.

Molly let out a snort of derisive laughter. "Yeah, like she'd believe us. Ghosts and seances and curses. It sounds like a bad B-rated horror movie."

"We can bring her back something as a sort of peace offering," Stephanie suggested. They all looked at her expectantly. "Well, you know how she's always looking for something and gets really excited if we find anything girly? Well, I think she's looking for Kissin' Kate Barlow's treasure. That book ya'll swiped said that it was buried somewhere on the lake."

Molly frowned. "But if the Warden has been looking for the treasure for years, what makes you think we'll be able to find it just like that?"

"I don't know..." Stephanie shrugged. "I mean, if we manage to lift the curse, the ghost of Kate Barlow will be released, right? She'll be able to be with her lover that was killed. Then she won't need the treasure anymore, so maybe we can convince her to tell us where she buried it?"

"It's a long shot, but it's the best plan we've had so far," Emily commented mildly.

Ayla pushed herself up on her elbows. "We don't have to worry about telling the Warden anything if we don't find the Wolfsbane, remember?"

"Oh my god!" Molly said suddenly, sitting straight up. "I had forgotten! My mom grows Wolfsbane in her garden! It's supposed to have medicinal purposes!"

"What good does that do us if your mom's garden is back in Tennessee?" Bethany muttered, annoyed.

Molly ignored her. "I can get her to mail me some!"

"We'll miss the full moon if we do that," Ayla mumbled to herself. "But I guess it's the only way. We'll just have to wait until the next full moon to go back to her grave."

"We'll have to wait?" Kali repeated.

Molly sighed heavily. "If I write a letter to my mom, it'll take at least a week to get to her. Maybe more. Then she'll have to send me the package with the Wolfsbane, which will take even longer."

"But that's alright," Erin said cheerfully, being optimistic. "We can survive another month without our powers, right?"

They mumbled their half-hearted agreement. They had grown used to their powers in the years that they had had them.

"Eh, it's hot in here," Ayla grumbled, climbing to her feet. "I'm going to go for a walk to cool off. I'll be back in a little bit."

It was cooler outside the tent, the night air washing over her like a refreshing breath. She took a deep breath and sighed, shrugging out of the sleeves of her orange jumpsuit. She was wearing her purple sports bra underneath, the one from Victoria's Secret that Bethany had accidentally gotten paint on. It felt nice to feel the air against her hot skin.

"Hey." A hand grabbed her upper arm as she passed the mess hall, stopping her in her tracks. She turned around to find one of the other campers leering at her. She recognized his face from mealtimes, but she didn't know his name.

She tried to jerk her arm out of his grasp, but he held tight. "Let go, you asshole," she demanded. "What the hell do you want?"

Without warning, he slammed her into the wall of the mess hall. The impact knocked the breath from her lungs and she gasped with the pain. He put his face close to hers; she could smell his rancid breath. His eyes roved over her half-naked body, with the tattoo of a butterfly on her hip and the silver belly button ring.

"What the hell is your problem?" she growled when she caught her breath, bringing her knee up to connect, probably quite painfully, with his groin. He groaned and released her, doubling over in pain. "You think you can just do whatever you want?" she snarled, bringing her fist back and punching him square in the nose. He let out a startled exclamation and stumbled backwards, blood gushing from his broken nose.

"Jesus," another voice interrupted them.

Ayla looked up to see Squid standing there, looking from her to the orange-clad boy howling on the ground, staining the dirt maroon with his blood. "What are you doing here?" she demanded, shaking her hand. She'd hit her attacker hard enough to bruise herself.

"I heard shouting and I came to help," he muttered, running his fingers through his dark hair. "But I clearly see you don't need any."

"I can take care of myself," she answered, stepping over the injured boy. "But thank you. What are you even doing out here?"

"I left something in the Wreck-Room so I was going back to get it," Squid answered, falling into step beside her. She automatically put her hand in his. "You shouldn't wander around here at night by yourself, you know. This is a camp for juvenile delinquents, after all, and ya'll are the only girls..."

She peered up at him through her shaggy bangs. "You don't seem like that."

He blushed crimson. "I mean, don't get me wrong, we've all thought about it. It's not like you girls are hardened criminals or anything. If we wanted it, we could take it."

"Have you thought about taking it?" Her tone was so calm and innocent that he blushed even more. She was rather enjoying making him blush.

"I mean-of course-we-I-" he stammered unintelligibly.

She laughed delightedly at his awkwardness.

"Anyway," he finally huffed. "It's way better if it's given than taken. That's what we think."

"Is that so?" she said mildly, stopping as they reached her tent. "Well, thank you for coming to my rescue again." She stood on her tiptoes and pressed her lips lightly to his. "I'll see you tomorrow then." And she ducked into the tent.

**Okay, another chapter for you. This story is really stupid, by the way. I re-read it and laughed really hard because it is completely ridiculous. But ah well, at least it's different. Anyway, I'll give you another update on my friends from this story, since it's been almost a year since I last updated this.**

**Bethany: It's still up in the air if she's a crack-whore stripper. Ah well. Still a college dropout and still teaching dance, I suppose.**

**Emily: She just got back from spending three months in Chile. Not much exciting happening on the Emily front right now. She's still the smartest person I know. I'd vote for her for president.**

**Erin: She's being Erin. Going to school and working at the same place. She's worked there for forever. I worked there for about six months my sophomore year of high school, but she's been there forever.**

**Kali: Ah, my little Kali-wali. She just had a baby girl last week. My first niece. Her name is Ava and I absolutely adore her. She is beautiful. It's really weird, though. My mom and Kali's mom were pregnant with us together (we're about two weeks apart) and hung out together, so she and I have been friends since before we were born. And now she has a baby herself. Crazy.**

**Molly: I don't hear much from Molly these days cause she's rarely in town anymore. She went to school several hours away, but she's still in college and doing well. She joined a Vaudeville troupe so that's pretty interesting. Molly is definitely one unique individual.**

**Stephanie: Well, Stephanie got engaged recently. She's going to make a beautiful bride. She was also diagnosed with ovarian cancer at the end of last year, so that's been a struggle. She's about to go in for her second round of chemotherapy soon.**

**And me, Ayla: It's weird to talk about myself, but I guess I can try. I'll be a senior next semester (so will everyone else except Kali, who went to cosmetology school instead of college and already graduated). I'm leaving for France at the end of the week for Spring Break. My boyfriend is studying abroad there, and I'm pretty sure he's going to propose to me while I'm there (at least I know he bought a ring). And that's about it...**


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